Silence is Golden
by Brian1127
Summary: Main focus is on the relationship between Paige and Emily; Paige has just transferred to Rosewood High and Emily falls for her instantly. There's just one slight problem: Paige doesn't talk. Slight AU, all four liars are seniors but Paige is a junior, no "A" and there was never an "Emaya," but Emily is still out to everyone.
1. Chapter 1

"Hanna, could you be any slower? We are already late, you don't have to 'touch up' anything. You look just fine!"

"Just one more minute, Em! I'm almost done," she replied.

Emily knew they would arrive late on their first day back from Christmas break; she wasn't quite sure exactly why she had offered Hanna a ride to school that day, knowing this was going to be the turnout. Emily was just anxious to start swimming again, mostly because she hadn't been able to for the past two weeks and also there had been a rumor spreading that a new girl was going to be transferring over from Whitko High, a rivalry school. Whitko has a fantastic swim program and as it turns out, the rumored girl was not only on their swim team, but one of the best swimmers they ever had.

"Could this be the one to finally challenge her and even possibly beat her?" Emily thought, "would she take her position as team captain? Will she make herself work even harder than she ever had before? Even possibly beat her own personal record?"

Her thoughts were interrupted by one of Hanna's many untimely outbursts, "Let's go already, you were the one complaining that we were going to be late!"

Emily pushed aside her thoughts for the time being and accompanied Hanna outside in the bitter Pennsylvania winter which, at that time, had been unusually colder than all the others. They sat in the already warm car, thankful that Emily had decided to start it fifteen minutes earlier.

As Emily drove off, Hanna unexpectedly brought up the new girl, "So Em, are you excited that there will be a new girl on the swim team? You think she's any good?"

Emily couldn't help but chuckle on the inside, of course she was excited that someone would be joining the swim team. "Well, for starters, it's just a rumor," Emily stated, "and secondly, if there is going to be a new girl, I would be ecstatic that we would receive a new member of the Sharks, especially if she's a Whitko Wildcat; those girls can really swim."

* * *

The two girls arrived at school just six minutes before the bell rang; they both had the same first period, Government, which neither of them really cared for at all, especially Hanna.

"If we're tardy I won't be a happy Emily today." she stated. Hanna just chuckled a little and replied, "Don't worry, it's right next to our lockers anyway which is close to the front doors; we'll make it."

Emily gave her a doubtful look but continued to trudge through the newly formed snow on the ground. She knew they wouldn't be late, but she still wanted to give Hanna a hard time about it, just because she could. Later, they arrived in Government about forty-five seconds before the bell rang; Emily took her seat in the back of the class while giving Hanna, who was taking her seat near the front of the class, a glaring 'I know we're not late but I'm still not happy about this' look. Hanna then proceeded to give her an 'I'm sorry but I know you will forgive me anyway so I don't really care' look in response.

All four girls, Emily, Hanna, Spencer and Aria have the first lunch after third period, and they all wandered towards their usual table to sit down and finish their meals.

"Hey, have any of you met the new girl?" Spencer asked.

"No, have you?" replied Emily.

"Yeah, I have, she's in my calculus class, but she's only a Junior, I believe; like maybe just turned sixteen; but she looks like she should be in college. She's like 5'10" or something and looks much older than she is she is probably super smart as well, considering she's in AP calculus as a Junior."

This sparked Emily's interest, "So the rumors are true," she thought, "I wonder if she's also on the swim team as well."

"She's really weird though, like awkward." Spencer added, "She literally says nothing and just nods her head 'yes' or 'no' at anything you ask her. It's almost like she's mute or something. Plus, since we had a test today, she had nothing to do so she just sat in the back of the class and observed us while drawing I think. I'm pretty sure she was drawing the class or something; whatever it was, she seemed pretty focused on whatever she was doing."

Spencer describing her sparked even more of Emily's interest; she was different; much like herself. Well, maybe not _quite _like that, but different nonetheless.

"What's her name?" Emily questioned.

"Paige I think. Paige...M something, but don't quote me on that, I was too busy acing my test on derivatives to pay much attention."

"What's she look like?" Hanna chimed in, asking the same question that was already gyrating around in Emily's mind.

"She has medium length, dark auburn hair up in a ponytail, fairly pale skin, dark brown eyes, and a really nice smile; she's tall, like I said, she's wearing a forest green t-shirt with a horse on it that said, "Whoever said money can't buy happiness, never owned a horse." She's also wearing blue jeans, and white, gray and black New Balance sneakers." Spencer answered.

"Ok, so you can remember like exactly what she was wearing, down to the color and brand of her shoes, but don't know what her full name is? Am I missing something here?" Aria teased.

"Oh, whatever," Spencer remarked, "it's just that certain things stand out to me more than others and you know how bad I am with names."

Emily chuckled at their exchanges; she hoped Paige's personality was as attractive as Spencer made her look.

* * *

After lunch was over, the four girls headed their separate ways; Aria to English, which was her favorite class, of course, Hanna to Physics, which, she hated the most, Spencer to AP French, and Emily to AP Chemistry. Emily had hoped to see the new girl sometime during the day; she knew what to look for at least, thanks to Spencer. She smiled at the thought of Spencer describing Paige, wondering why she paid so much attention to every detail about her.

She quickly withdrew her thoughts as she casually strolled into class; she was suddenly aware of an unfamiliar figure sitting in the seat right next to her own. She was awestruck at the sight of her new lab partner. _Her _new lab partner, the one who had already taken a liking to the lab set in front of her, curiously looking it up and down, as if wondering how science works. Mr. Dyck had apparently made them lab partners due to the fact that before, she was the only one without a partner.

"God she's even prettier than Spencer said she was" she thought, and it didn't take long to realize why Spencer knew exactly what she was wearing, for every part of her stood out like a fire burning in the night. Her hair, her smile, her eyes, her everything.

As Emily sat down, she couldn't take her eyes off Paige; she was caught in her magnetic field and had absolutely no way of escaping any time soon. The bell rang; Emily was taking her book out of her bag, eyes still glued to the girl just inches away from her, as Paige noticed Emily sitting down, she glanced over only to be met by Emily's warm, brown eyes that mirrored her own. They sat there, in silence, for a little longer than they probably should have, just staring at each other. They curved their lips simultaneously, both welcoming each other's presence with their own unique, warm smile. Mr. Dyck then began the lesson as both girls looked forward, but Emily never fully paid attention to what the teacher was saying; instead, she stole glances at an ever-so-focused Paige, who was copying all of the notes on the board into her college-ruled notebook and seemed not the slightest bit interested in the tan-skinned girl sitting next to her.

After the lesson was over, while Mr. Dyck was handing out the homework assignment, Emily took the opportunity to talk to Paige, who was just finishing her notes.

"Hi," Emily said as Paige was just closing her notebook. Paige looked over, smiled her sweet smile, and gave her a 'Hi' nod back, then proceeded to slip her notebook away and zip her backpack.

"Wow, Spencer was right," Emily thought, "she really isn't one for many words."

"Are you enjoying your first day here at Rosewood so far?" Emily inquired. Paige nodded, smiling. Emily was determined now to get her to say something, she wanted to hear her voice; she wanted to know how it sounded, if it was just as beautiful to hear as Paige was to look at.

"What class do you have next?" Emily prodded. Paige reached into her back pocket, pulling out a folded piece of paper. Opening it, she pointed to her 5th period class on her schedule, which was Athletic Conditioning; Emily had that same class next as well.

"Me too." replied Emily, with excitement in her voice that was a little too obvious not to notice. Paige simply smiled, folded her schedule, and slipped it back into her pocket

"Oh, that smile could melt iron." Emily thought

Just then, the bell rang, signaling the end of 4th period.

"Walk with me?" Emily asked, "I mean since we have the same class next, I can show you where it is."

Paige gave her a 'thank you' smile and grabbed her backpack, flinging it over her shoulder. Emily noticed Paige's large bicep moving under her light skin as she lifted the weight on her right shoulder. Emily was a sucker for strong women, both mentally and physically. So far Paige is one for two; halfway there.

Emily made a mental note that if Paige was also a swimmer, it would be very distracting to have someone like that swimming right next to her; especially in class as well. She could already feel her GPA dropping every moment she spent with Paige. "This is going to be a long semester." she thought.


	2. Chapter 2

**Alright, I've gotten much more positive feedback with this story than I had anticipated and I would like to take the time to thank everyone for reading, reviewing, and following! I'm hoping I can continue to write and please all of you Paily lovers out there :)**

* * *

"Am I the only one who thinks that physics is the worst class ever? I mean, who cares about terminal velocity and polarization anyways?" Hanna complained.

Paige and Emily were standing by Emily's locker while Hanna came up from behind them; Emily was attempting to stuff her Chemistry, Pre-Calculus, and History books in her locker, which was already overfilled with useless papers, notebooks, and folders she would never use.

"Maybe people who care about passing the class." Emily replied, knowing this was the second time Hanna was taking it.

"Whatever, I'm not going to be the next Albert Einstein; if an apple falls on my head, I'm not going to question it, I'm just going to take a Tylenol." she said.

"Actually that was Newton, but good effort." Emily replied sarcastically.

Choosing to ignore her, Hanna suddenly became aware of the stranger who had been standing there staring at them for the past thirty seconds or so.

"Hey, aren't you the new girl?" Hanna questioned, "it's Paige, right?"

Paige smiled and nodded, while giving a polite, but awkward, wave.

"Oh, yeah, that's right. You don't talk much, do you? That's alright, some people are just born mute." Hanna innocently commented. "anyways, I have to go. English awaits and I'm hoping Mr. Fitz liked my essay. I'll catch up with you later."

Emily couldn't help but feel embarrassed at Hanna's ignorant yet innocent comments.

"I'm really sorry about that, she's just, well, she's just Hanna." Emily apologized.

Paige looked at her, smiled and shrugged her shoulders as if to say, "Yeah, we all know those kinds of people." Paige then pointed in the direction of their next class, asking if that is where they need to go.

"Yeah, we should get going, don't want to be late."

And with that, Emily shut her locker and they walked together towards the gym. Emily couldn't help but steal glances over at Paige; she was so captivating and Emily was clueless to how much this girl would mean to her.

* * *

The two girls arrive at their next class with about a minute to spare. Many of the girls had already arrived in the locker room and were halfway done changing into their gym clothes. Since Paige had not been here before, she didn't have a locker assigned to her. The coach said that she could pick any locker she wanted for now; she chose the one next to Emily.

Emily couldn't help but feel exited, but she figured that if Paige knew the truth about her, she would have probably chosen a locker as far away from her as possible. Paige was bound to find out sooner or later though, most likely from one of Hanna's inevitable slip-ups. Emily just hoped she could avoid until she had at least formed some sort of friendship with the girl; otherwise it could be disastrous.

Paige began to slip her shirt off, revealing a tight, toned and subtle six pack underneath. Emily's breath hitched; she had to force her eyes off of Paige in order to continue breathing.

Emily messed with the lock on her locker, pretending to struggle with it. When Paige finally got dressed, Emily opened her locker and threw her shirt and pants off in a hurry and slipped her t-shirt and shorts on with lightning speed in order to catch Paige as she was walking out into the gym. They walked together and sat down next to each other on the lowest bleacher seat, waiting for the coach to do attendance.

As the coach read off the names, Emily decided to see if the rumor was true, if Paige was really a swimmer.

"Is it true that you will be joining the swim team? I heard that you were a good swimmer and that you had been on the Wildcat swim team at your old school."

Paige smiled and nodded.

"That's great! Me too!" Emily half shouted, "In fact, I'm actually the team captain and I hold the school record for fastest freestyle and butterfly."

Paige's face lit up as she smiled exuberantly at Emily's interjection. It was obvious that Paige had been enjoying Emily's company so far, and by the looks of it, she would enjoy spending time together in the pool.

"Emily Fields." the coach called out.

"Here." Emily replied. "Well," she said, turning her attention back to the girl next to her, "it looks like we will be seeing a lot of each other this year. In case you don't know, we have swim practice right after school, if you would like, since I'm the team captain, I could show you where to go after school. Just meet me at my locker. What's your 7th period?"

Paige then proceeded to motion herself playing a trumpet.

"Oh, you're in the band 7th? That's so cool. I take it you play the trumpet; it's one of my favorite instruments."

Paige smiled and nodded.

"Paige McCullers." coach called. Paige raised her hand as coach Fulton wrote down that she was present.

The coach proceeded to go down the rest of the list, counting off everyone who was here.

"Alright girls," she stated, "last names "A" through "M" are going to be working in the weight room and last names "N" through "Z" will be on the track. Get going, you know what to do."

"I guess this means we get to work out together." Emily said excitedly.

* * *

Paige and Emily were the first to arrive in the weight room. Immediately, Paige meandered toward the bench press.

"I guess this is where you would like to start, huh?" Emily concluded.

Paige nodded, motioning for Emily to use it first. Emily wasn't sure why she wanted her to go first, but she complied anyway.

"Well, I'll start out at 50lbs and work my way up I guess."

They proceeded to add weights to either side of the bar; then Emily went to lay down under the heavy metal while Paige moved over to be her spotter. Emily gripped the bar tightly, pushing it up a few inches and then down to her chest; she continued to do five reps and then stopped.

"Can you add five to each side please? I feel like I can do more."

And with that, Paige then added the extra weight Emily had asked for. Emily did ten reps and then quit.

"Your turn now." she said.

They switched places without changing the weight. Paige lifted the bar twice, then put it back, motioning for Emily to add five more to each side. Emily complied. Now with the weight at 70lbs, Paige proceeded to do five reps, then stopped. Paige motioned for Emily to add five more to each side again.

"Are you sure you will be able to handle it?" Emily asked, concerned that she may be overdoing it.

Paige just smiled keenly, and nodded. Emily was in no position to argue, so she did what she was asked. Now, Paige was lifting 80lbs and she then continued to do ten reps, then quit, knowing she had other exercises to do.

"What's next?" Emily asked

Paige looked around; she noticed that many of the machines had already been taken so she motioned to Emily that they could do push-ups. Emily agreed and they wandered over to the far corner of the room, away from most of the activity.

"Why don't we time each other and see how many we can each do in a minute?" Emily suggested.

Paige nodded, agreeing to her request. She then laid down on the floor waiting for Emily to start timing her.

"Ok, ready... Go!"

Paige was on a roll; she did 30 in 30 seconds and finished another 10 in the last half. Emily was dumbfounded.

"Well, I'm screwed." she thought, "why does she have to be so perfect?"

"Ok, my turn to lose now." Emily joked.

Paige just stood up and chuckled lightly, enjoying Emily's self-proclaimed defeat. Emily took her position on the ground and waited for the signal. Paige tapped her on the shoulder, telling her to begin. Though she only did a total of 18, Emily was pretty proud of herself because it was the most she had ever done in such a short period of time.

Emily stood up, her arms feeling like Jell-O.

"Wow," she said, "we should probably work on a different part of our body, huh?" Emily questioned.

Paige agreed, she motioned to do sit-ups next, in which Emily agreed to.

"Same thing; we time each other for a minute. I'll go first, then you can go and show me up. How 'bout that?"

Paige just smiled her warm smile and nodded, waiting for Emily to sit down so she could start timing her. Paige gave her the signal, and Emily began her workout.

Emily was able to conjure up 35 sit-ups in a minute, which was also her personal best as well. It was Paige's turn next, Emily timed her; Paige completed an outstanding 50 sit-ups in just one minute.

"No wonder she has a six pack." Emily concluded.

Paige stood up, satisfied with her performance.

Coach Fulton was walking around and checking to make sure everyone was doing what they were supposed to and not just goofing off. Coach passed Paige and Emily, happy to see that they were working hard and getting along.

"I'm loving the energy you two, but try not to overdo it because you have a rigorous swim practice ahead of you." coach warned.

"Don't worry, it's nothing we can't handle, right Paige?"

Paige nodded in agreement, glad to see the coach making sure they took care of themselves. Her old coach wasn't like that; she was just one for results.

"Alright, glad to hear it; and Paige, we are so lucky to have someone like you joining our team. I sure hope you feel welcome here at Rosewood and if you have any questions, you can ask me or I'm sure Emily would be more than happy to assist you."

And with that, she smiled and left to check on the girls on the track.

There was only about 10 minutes left in class before they had to leave; Both Emily and Paige decided that they would just ride the stationary bikes for the last 5 minutes in order to cool down and then head to the locker room so they wouldn't be late to their next class.

* * *

"What class do you have next?" Emily asked while putting her gym clothes in her locker. She had fallen even more in love with Paige with every moment she spent with her. She thought it was going to be hard at first, but now she knew it would be nearly impossible to do anything as long as they were together. "Swim practice is going to be a bitch." she thought.

Paige pulled out her schedule after closing her locker; she pointed to her next class, which was U.S. History. Emily was aware then that they would only share two classes together for the year; this made her both happy and sad considering how much she liked being around her, and how much of a distraction she can be.

"Ah, I have Economics next. Well, at least we share two classes together. Plus swim practices, so that's a bonus." Emily said, "That reminds me, don't forget we have one tonight after school until 5:30. Be ready for a "rigorous" practice."

Paige smiled, nodded and motioned for Emily to follow her out of the locker room.

* * *

The bell rang, signaling the beginning of 7th period; Emily liked Spanish, but mostly because she got to sit next to Aria the whole period and talk about everything but Spanish.

"So, I hear you met the new girl; what's she like? Is she anything like Spencer said she was?" Aria inquired.

"She's definitely quiet, that's for sure. We had two periods together, both of which we spent the entire time with each other and I still have no idea what her voice sounds like." Emily replied

"Really? Is she even able to speak at all? Like, does she have some sort of condition or something?" Aria wondered.

"I'm not 100% sure on that one. Maybe she's just socially awkward; I really can't tell. But she seems super sweet; just the way she doesn't talk gets to me, it's like, when I'm around her, she has this magnetic field surrounding her and I'm made of metal. She is so in shape too, it blows my mind. She has to have some sort of hardcore workout routine or something; she benched like 80lbs and did like 50 sit-ups in a minute. She also has a six pack, which is sexy as hell, might I add." Emily beamed. "She is also on the swim team and I hear she's really good; plus she must look mighty fine in a one-piece, just sayin'"

"Well, it seems as though you may have fallen pretty hard for this girl, Em, and you've known her for how long?" Aria asked teasingly.

"Yeah, I guess you could say I have. But it would be really nice to actually have a conversation with her. Not just me talking and her listening, you know? Is it normal to like someone this much after you've known them no more than two hours?"

"Absolutely." Aria answered, very sure of her response. "That's what happened with Ezra and I."

"That does make me feel better, thanks Aria."

"No, problem. It's what I'm here for."

* * *

After class ended, Emily and Aria strolled out of Spanish, still unsure of whether or not they had an assignment due tomorrow.

"Hey Em, I'm going to leave early and catch up with Ezra, good luck with practice and good luck with Paige." Aria said, winking when she mentioned Paige.

"Thanks, Aria, and good luck with Ezra." Emily winked back. She was headed toward her locker when she spotted a very familiar figure waiting for her.

"Wow, she's actually meeting me. I figured she might just head over to the natatorium." Emily thought. "Maybe I do have a chance."


	3. Chapter 3

** I can see that you lovelies don't give a guy a break ;) So, here is the third chapter, as you all demanded it. Hopefully there will be plenty of updates in the future because I have a very good idea of where I would like this story to end up, but it's coming up with everything in between that's difficult. But being me, I tend to be a people pleaser, and therefore I will continue; also writing can be a very good stress reliever too. So, enjoy!**

* * *

"Alright ladies, listen up. Our next swim meet will be against the Lady Warriors from Tippy Valley; they are our toughest competition and you know it. This week will be dedicated to perfection; the last time we were up against them they drowned us in perfection. Perfection will be the only thing that will satisfy me this week. But lucky for us, we have been blessed with a new member of the team, a Lady Wildcat; I hope you all make Miss Paige McCullers feel welcome and appreciated."

The entire Sharks swim team glanced over at Paige and Emily who were standing near the back of the group. Paige's face grew beet red as she half smiled and dipped her head down. Emily knew Paige hated being the center of attention, she would have to remind coach of that after practice.

"Ok, girls. This practice we will be doing warm ups and then we will have ourselves a few races later on to see who needs to work on what the rest of the week. First will be my freestyle girls, and I would like it if you, Paige, would join them along with my butterfly girls later on, as I see those seem to be your strong suits. Now, lets hit the pool, ladies."

The team of Sharks led the way out into the natatorium while Paige and Emily brought up the rear.

"Are you excited to be swimming for the Sharks? Or do you prefer your old team? Emily asked.

Paige thought for a second, then shrugged her shoulders. She couldn't really say for sure because this was her first practice, but she hoped that she would like it better here considering this is where she will be for the next year and a half.

"You'll like it here; all the girls are really nice, and coach Fulton is amazing . She can help you with anything you're having trouble with, whether it be your form, your take-off, anything."

Paige gave an appreciative smile and continued walking towards the pool. As they entered the natatorium, coach called for everyone to swim a few warm up laps and then the freestyle girls would have a little race.

"I usually swim at the very end of the pool, would you like to swim with me?" Emily questioned, hoping not to sound too desperate to be with her; although she pretty much knew she had blown her cover way before practice even started.

Paige smiled and nodded, continuing her way towards the very far edge of the pool with Emily. When they reached it, they both simultaneously jumped in and began a decent pace. They swam perfectly in sync with each other for six laps; coach had just then called for the all the non-freestyle swimmers to jump out and do some stretches while the others prepared for the race.

Paige and Emily, along with five other girls, brought themselves to the ready position as coach Fulton blew the whistle.

Emily hurled off the platform with tremendous force; and so did Paige. They both swam in sync, forgetting the world around them. Gracefully, both girls somersaulted simultaneously. Pushing off, both girls were still swimming side by side, floating through the water with ease. As they reached the halfway point, Emily slowly started to get a lead on Paige, but not for long, as Paige's adrenaline started pushing her harder, faster; as they reached the edge, Emily brought in a burst of new found energy and took the lead by a half second.

Both girls sprang up out of the pool and were met by a very happy looking coach.

"Congratulations, Emily! You just beat your own personal record by ¾ of a second, and with Paige a half second behind, beat your old record by a ¼! If you perform this well in the competition, we will have those Valley girls runnin' for the hills. Great job, both of you; you better perform this well later on; remember, perfection is the only thing that will please me this week, and you are off to a very good start." the coach beamed.

"Oh, my gosh Paige! That was amazing! I've never had someone push me that hard before, and it looks like this is starting out to be a very good set up for us, don't you agree?" Emily asked.

Paige nodded, grinning from ear to ear, her smile had never been brighter; Emily could tell that she was just as excited as she was.

"Next I want my best backstrokers to jump in and do the same thing." coach shouted. Neither Emily nor Paige were very good at the backstroke so they sat this round out.

When it came time to do the butterfly, Paige and Emily were both in the ready position and flew off the platforms at the sound of the coach's whistle. They both pushed with all their might despite having just raced a few minutes ago. After the initial flip, Paige had started to pull ahead; and Emily couldn't catch up in time when Paige hit the wall first, almost an entire second in front of Emily!

The entire team was in an uproar as coach Fulton was practically jumping for joy as Paige had just set a new school record by just under 1 ½ seconds. Paige was dumbfounded, and smiling so bright, if Emily had been anywhere but the water, she would have fallen to her knees. After the shock wore off, Paige was grabbed and pulled out of the water and greeted by the entire swim team.

Alycia, the most outspoken of the group, rushed up and gave Paige a big bear hug which was a little too personal for Paige, but for the time being she just decided to ignore and just go with it.

"Oh my god!" Alycia shouted, "You are like the best thing to happen to this team besides Emily!"

"Alright, Alycia, I don't think Paige is one for your hugs at the present moment." Emily interjected, a little annoyed that she wasn't the one to be able to fully congratulate her first. But she was right, Paige was beginning to be a little too uncomfortable and started to pull herself out of the hug; she walked away, half hugging herself at the slight discomfort she felt by human contact. Her smile had disappeared and Emily felt heartbroken that such a big feat in Paige's life had just been ruined by Alycia.

Coach Fulton was suddenly realizing that Paige was a little too uneasy and decided to end practice a few minutes early in order to talk to her and make sure she wasn't too traumatized by the situation. She knew Paige would have to be dealt with in a different fashion than the other girls; she just didn't want the new record holder to fold under all the unnecessary pressure given by her teammates.

"Ok girls, go to the lockers and shower or change or whatever, and meet me back here in about fifteen minutes."

The girls all headed towards the locker room except Paige, who was stopped by coach Fulton.

"Hey, I noticed you seemed a little uncomfortable back there; is everything alright?" asked coach Fulton.

Paige nodded slightly, still hugging herself; she didn't want to be hugged anymore than she wanted to be singled out for being uncomfortable about it.

"Alright, well, if you need anything, or need to talk to anybody about something, I'm always here for you girls. They all know that and I want to make sure you know that as well. Also, I would like to keep seeing those record breaking times like I saw today, great job by the way; I'm really proud of you and I'm sure everyone else is as well, especially Alycia." coach added.

Paige gave a slight grin, smiling at coach's added humor; she was very happy to have a coach like that, unlike her previous one. Already she was beginning to feel like this place was much better than her old school; she actually smiled here.

"Ok, well, I've pretty much said all I've had to say for now, but if you need to talk but don't feel comfortable coming to me, then I'm sure Emily would be a great help to you. She tends to be one everyone can talk to. Well, on your way then, I'm going to have a little chat with the rest of the team but I want you and Emily to be in the locker rooms for it, ok?"

Paige gave an understanding nod and walked towards the locker room to take a well needed shower.

* * *

Emily wandered into the locker room curious as to what the coach was talking to Paige about. She figured she noticed her very blatant discomfort for the situation and was telling her that she will take care of it.

Emily proceeded towards her locker when she noticed Paige's bookbag slightly opened, revealing a sketchbook that looked quite welcoming. She chastised herself for thinking about rummaging through Paige's belongings and continued to change out of her swimsuit.

A few moments later, Emily was fully dressed and Paige had still not arrived back from the pool. She looked at her bookbag and stared at it for a while. Disregarding all her common sense, she quickly grabbed the sketchbook out of the bag and looked through it.

There was an array of intricate drawings consisting of mostly different perspectives of horses, girls with horses, different settings like a park with kids running around, a small town square, a beach sunset, and a multitude of classrooms, drawn from the perspective of the back of the room; one room in particular looked quite familiar, it was Mrs. Troyer's math class, and she could see a few of her peers drawn in the room, one of which looked a lot like Spencer. There were many more pages left to see but she heard a door open and she swiftly put the drawings back in their original place.

Paige came around the corner, still in her swimsuit and proceeded to change in front of her. Emily tore

her eyes away with all her internal strength she could muster. She couldn't risk the potential awkwardness, both for her own sake, and Paige's.

Emily waited until everyone had left in order to speak to the coach alone. Coach Fulton was rustling papers when Emily entered her office.

"Hey, Coach." Emily said, "What'd you think about Paige's time?"

"I don't think I could be any happier with the way she seems to have adjusted to our team, but I'm concerned with how the other teammates will treat her. Not in a negative way, but it seems as though Paige isn't one for much social stimulation and that's basically what I pointed out to them before they left. To make sure they don't make her uncomfortable like that again. I'm pretty sure you already knew that so I felt no need to lecture you about it as well."

"Yeah, I understand. She hasn't said a word to me all day and we spent two full periods together not including swim practice. Do you know if she has some sort of condition or anything? You know, that makes her like that?" Emily inquired.

"Hmm, I'm pretty sure that if she does, it's a mental thing, not an actual physical ailment per say." coach said. "But anyways, hopefully she will open up eventually, for now though, we just need to focus on those swim times, and beating those Valley girls."

"Same here." Emily agreed, "Well, anyways, I'll see you tomorrow. G'nite."

"Night Em, drive safe." coach warned.

* * *

Emily stepped out into the whistling winter wind and prodded through the snow to reach her soon-to-be warm Toyota. Before she hopped in, a familiar figure caught her attention. It was Paige, she was sitting on a bench near the front doors, shivering, phone in hand, looking completely helpless and alone. Emily couldn't help but feel bad for the poor girl, she didn't even have any gloves on. She walked swiftly but carefully over to her, but Paige hadn't noticed her and stood up and walked towards the road. Emily caught up with her.

"Paige," she said, "hey, are you okay? Do you have a ride home?

Paige turned around at the sound of her soft voice. She didn't want Emily to see her vulnerable like this; she cursed her dad who had promised to pick her up after practice but he didn't show up and didn't answer his phone. She assumed he forgot and had already left for his business trip to Scranton, where her mother was as well.

Paige paused for a minute, looking into Emily's caring and concerned eyes. She was defeated. She nodded, implying she had no ride and was forced to walk home in the cold weather.

"Come, I'm taking you home." Emily stated rather than asked. She wasn't going to let Paige freeze out here.

Paige hesitated but then reluctantly followed her to her car, stuffing her backpack into the back seat and climbing into the passenger seat.

Emily hopped in the driver's seat and immediately started the car to warm them up.

"Where do you live?" Emily asked.

Paige took out her schedule which conveniently had her address on it and showed it to Emily.

"That's not too far from where I live, I know exactly where it is." Emily stated

Emily then proceeded to drive towards their destination.

* * *

The car ride was silent. Emily had attempted to make conversation but to no avail. Emily pulled up to Paige's driveway which was fairly long and had a white picket fence along both sides. As she approached her house, she noticed a decent sized stable in the back.

"I wonder if she owns horses? It would make sense." Emily thought.

As she continued, Emily saw a large, white house with a fenced in backyard.

"Dogs? Young kids maybe?" Emily thought; she wanted to know more about Paige and where she lived as well. Along with how her and her parents got along; considering she was left in the cold she assumed probably not very well. She wondered if she had any younger or older siblings as well.

Emily pulled up to the house; Paige grabbed her bookbag from the back seat and opened the door. Just as she was about to shut it; she stopped herself. Emily wasn't sure what was going on in her mind, but her question was answered when Paige looked at her.

"Thanks."

And that was all she said.


	4. Chapter 4

**Ok, now I know a lot of you lovelies have been waiting for this and I apologize that it has taken a little longer than usual. Sometimes you just have to be in the right mindset to write and it just hasn't been that good for me the last few days. Plus school also takes priority as well, sorry :( But here it is; Chapter 4... Enjoy!**

**P.S. I want to thank all of my amazing reviewers, followers, etc. for letting me share my story with you and taking the time to tell me how much you love it :D You are awesome and I love you all! **

* * *

"Guys, this is just too hard. I don't know if I can take much more of this." Aria complained, staring down at her lunch tray.

"It's easy, just remember, the food goes _in_ your mouth." Spencer teasingly replied.

"I'm not talking about the food, Spence. I'm talking about Ezra. He still hasn't replied to any of my calls or texts since last night, and I'm getting really worried." Aria expressed.

"How bad could it be?" Hanna asked, "I'm sure he just got caught up doing something else and is just a little hung up. It was just a trip to Philly, and besides, he's been out of contact with you for longer than that and nothing bad has happened."

"Hanna's right, Aria." Spencer added, "it was just an author's meeting. What can happen at an author's meeting? It's not like he'd get stoned for not using enough alliteration or anything like that."

"That's not what I'm worried about. We got in this huge argument last night and it did _not_ end well; and by "not ending well." I mean he practically just told me to drop off the face of the Earth." Aria added.

"Ok, here's what you do," Hanna interjected, "you go to his apartment, wait for him to get there, strip down completely, and lounge on his favorite chair. He will forget all about the fight the moment he walks in and..."

"No! None of your advice! It's not welcome at the moment." Spencer stated, harshly, "If anything, just do the normal cliché thing and go there and talk to him. I know cliché isn't really your thing, but it works for the most part. Or you could just give him time to cool off, which would probably be better in this situation."

"Well, I guess you're right." Aria admitted, "but what if we really are done with? What if he really doesn't care?"

"Of course he cares!" Hanna exclaimed, "There is no way he doesn't care for you. It was just a heat of the moment thing and you have to let him cool down, like Spencer said. She's right about the cliché thing too, it actually works."

"Well, there's no arguing that is there." Aria figured, "I'll go see him after school, later in the evening."

"Good," Spencer stated, "now that we've figured that mess out, let's figure this one out..."

All three girls turned their attention towards Emily, who had been blankly staring down at her food for the past seven minutes or so, seemingly enthralled in a world of her own.

"Yo Em, Earth to Em." Hanna said, "Emily, you've been smiling like an idiot for the past five minutes. What on Earth has gotten you so dazed?"

Emily, who had just began to slip back into reality, looked at the stares of all three of her friends, waiting for an answer to a question she didn't even know.

"Um... ah... Wh-what?" Emily asked.

"Uh, well, you've basically been sitting there trying to vaporize your vegetables for the past five minutes or so. What gives? Why are you suddenly so happy?" Spencer inquired.

"Oh, that. Well, um... I don't really know for sure." Emily lied, knowing full well what the cause of her happiness was. It was Paige. Not just her, but her voice; it was so low and husky she practically melted in the driver's seat last night. She almost had to think twice on whether or not she had heard her right, but it was definitely an unfamiliar voice that, frankly, she would never get tired of hearing.

"Bull. Crap." Hanna said, calling her bluff. Emily knew they could tell; she was a terrible liar. "It's that new girl, isn't it?"

"Ooohh, I sensed tension when you heard that" Spencer teased, "It's been less than a day and you can't stop thinking about her can you?"

"No." Emily said, admitting defeat. "She's just so damn perfect, it seems. Like during swim practice, she was flying through the water like it wasn't even there; she set a freaking school record at her first swim practice here. I can't even begin to explain it, she pushed me so hard last night that I broke my personal record along with a school record as well. It.. it.. I don't know why, but I literally think I'm in love with her already. I know that may sound bad, but it.. just..." Emily trailed off, unable to conjure up the feelings she had for Paige and put them into words.

"Oh my God, Em, that's incredible!" Hanna squealed, "You and mute girl would make an amazing couple..."

"Hanna!" Spencer chastised. It was evident to everyone but her that that would be the worst thing to say to Emily, under the circumstances.

"Actually," Emily started, "she's not mute..."

"What!?" all three girls exclaimed simultaneously.

"Wait, so you're saying she can talk, but chooses not to? Why on Earth would anyone do that?" Hanna asked, quite confused at the present moment. "What did she say to you?"

"Yeah, Em," Aria added, "what did she say?"

"Well, nothing much. She just thanked me for driving her home last night." Emily answered.

"Whoa, hold the phone," Hanna exclaimed, "you _drove_ her home last night? So you know where she lives and everything? This just keeps getting better and better!"

"Ok, slow down there miss 'jump to conclusions,'" Aria stated, "obviously nothing happened between them."

"Aria's right, nothing happened." Emily added, still wondering why they were still having this conversation.

"Well, anyways," Spencer stated, "we're happy you found a new friend. A friend who can definitely help you with your math homework, let me tell you. She freaking aced the test today, you know, the one we took yesterday. The teacher said if she studied that night, she could take the test for extra credit since she wasn't there when we learned it, and she freaking aced it! Can you believe that?"

"Wow, she can swim, ace calculus tests, what's next? Win a Nobel Peace Prize?" Hanna sarcastically remarked.

"Ha, I wouldn't doubt it." Emily added.

The girls had spent so much time talking about Paige that they lost track of time; the bell had already rung by time they finished their meals and one by one they threw their garbage away and headed towards their next class.

This was the first time in her life that Emily could say she was looking forward to AP Chemistry.

* * *

Emily quickly strolled towards her next class, arriving a little earlier than usual. As she walks in, she finds Paige, and nonchalantly meanders towards her. But before she got there, Paige had noticed her and looked up at her, with a big smile on her face.

"For the love of all that is good and pure in this world, don't trip or do anything stupid." Emily thought, knowing that of all the times she does something stupid, this would be one of those times.

Thankfully, Emily safely makes it to her seat just before the bell rings.

"Hey," Emily greets.

Paige just continues with her smile and glances down at her homework; which was due today by the way.

"Oh shit," Emily thought, "that was due today and I didn't even look at it. I was too busy thinking about _her."_

"Alright, everyone, pass your homework forward and we will continue with the lesson by doing a lab today." said Mr. Dyck.

"Hey, Mr. Dyck, I don't get this homework at all. And neither does anyone else." said Noel Khan, the most popular kid in school.

"It's true," said Amy Pierce, a fellow student, "nobody understands this at all."

"Well, I guess in that case, I will spend class time going over it with you and we can start the lab tomorrow." Mr. Dyck said.

"Whew, off the hook today." Emily thought, as she proceeded to pull out her unfinished homework. Paige on the other hand, pulled out her homework which had been completed the night before.

"Whoa, wait a minute," Emily said, "you understand this stuff?"

Paige smiled and nodded, putting her homework aside and grabbing her sketchbook from her bookbag.

She opened it up to an unfinished drawing of a horse and rider clearing a pretty large jump; it was outlined and only partially shaded in. Paige began to shade light strokes with her pencil and completely lost touch with the rest of the world.

Emily was awestruck at the sight of Paige becoming one with her drawing; she couldn't focus on the lesson at this point, all she cared about was the woman sitting next to her.

"Ok, the whole GPA dropping thing, yeah, that's happening right now." Emily thought, still transfixed on Paige's light touch of her pencil.

A few minutes passed and Emily was straining to pay close attention to Mr. Dyck as he helped the class with last nights homework, but there was no way she would be able to withstand the temptation of staring blankly at her lab partner. Then, she had an idea...

"Hey, Paige?" She asked, hoping to get her attention. Which she did, because the auburn haired girl stopped her strokes and looked up at her with those deep, brown eyes of hers and smiled.

"Would it be alright if you helped me out with this? It's really just not sticking with me." she asked.

Paige nodded and put aside her drawing. Now, leaning over towards Emily as if asking what her question is.

"Well, how do you convert liters into moles? I don't really get the math for that." Emily asked.

Paige began to write the math equation out for her and then solved it step by step in a way that was easy for Emily to follow.

"Oh, ha, now I get it, thanks Paige." Emily said with a smile. She then continued on with the rest of the homework assignment and finished it right before the bell rang. Also Paige had just wrapped up the rest of her drawing as she had finished it as well.

* * *

"Meet me in the gym? We have athletic conditioning next." Emily stated, walking towards her locker.

Paige nodded as both girls headed to Emily's locker. Paige had decided to wait for Emily to stuff her unnecessary books back into her locker in order to make her bookbag lighter. They both then headed towards the locker rooms to change for gym class.

* * *

In the locker rooms, Emily couldn't help but steal glances at Paige's abs again; for they were just so perfect. As they entered the gym coach Fulton pulled them aside, informing them that tonight's swim practice was canceled due to a family issue of hers.

After that, coach called attendance, and announced that everyone who was in the weight room yesterday was to be on the track today and vice versa. Both girls then proceeded to jog the track the rest of the period in silence.

* * *

After gym, Emily again stole glances at Paige's perfect body and then the unexpected happened. Paige turned to Emily, and said, "I... I don't have a ride home."

Emily was shocked, mostly because that was the second time Paige had spoken to her, and also that she had no way home.

"Aren't your parents supposed to pick you up?" Emily asked.

"Th..they...don't get h..home... til' later this... evening." Paige stuttered, "m..maybe n..not until t...tomorrow."

"Well, does this mean you need a ride home again?"

Paige just looked at her like a lost puppy, and nodded gently. She hated to admit it though, but she didn't want to walk home in the cold like this.

"Well alright then, meet me at my locker after school and I'll be glad to give you a lift home." Emily said, smiling brightly. She didn't want the excitement that filled her to show on her face so she looked away and grabbed her bag in order to hide it. She was able to contain it enough to give Paige another smile, shut her locker, and scurry out the door.

* * *

After the last bell had rung, Emily rushed to her locker like as fast as she could without making herself seem too weird. She had to wait a few minutes before Paige showed up but when she did, she was greeted with a bright smile and eager looking Paige.

"Why did she look so happy?" Emily thought. But she quickly pushed away her thoughts and greeted Paige with a smile as well.

"All set?" She asked.

Paige responded with a smile and started off in the direction of the parking lot.

* * *

On the way there, Emily decided to ask a question that has been burning inside of her from the get go.

"Hey, Paige. Is... Is there a reason you don't speak that much?" Emily asked cautiously, hoping not to upset her in any way.

Paige just looked at her, and smiled her usual smile.

"Well, I take it you're not going to tell me, so I'll just have to find out for myself." Emily added playfully. Paige chuckled and continued to stare out the window.

* * *

When they arrived at Paige's house, Emily couldn't help but notice how different it had looked from the night before. The sun was shining and she could see clearly a few horses grazing by the barn she saw last night.

As they sat there, Emily had waited for Paige to leave but she didn't; she just sat there, staring out towards where the horses were standing.

Paige turned towards Emily, and Emily grew even more curious as to what was going on in that head of hers. But before she had time to speak, Paige answered her question.

"You don't have anywhere important to be right now, do you?" Paige inquired.

Emily was a little taken back by the question but quickly responded with, "Well, no, not in particular. In fact my mom thinks I'm still at practice. So no I don't have anywhere to be right now. Why do you ask?

Paige paused, hesitantly finding the right words to say. She knew if she asked outright that Emily would know that she didn't want her to leave. But she also knew that if she didn't ask, then she would have to go even longer without seeing her again, and she didn't want to do that.

"Well, um.. do... do you like horses?" Paige asked, unable to think of anything else to say.

Emily was very curious as to what Paige had in mind, but she figured it would give her a reason to stay and that was enough for her.

"Yeah, actually. I think they're pretty neat." Emily replied.

"Well, um... would you.. um.. like to see... my... ho..rses...?" Paige asked, kicking herself for asking such a ridiculous question. "Of course she didn't, you dumbass, she just wanted to go home where it was warm and she didn't have to be around your ugly butt." She just wanted to disappear. She regretted ever opening her mouth; every time she did, something wrong came out.

"I'd love to." Emily responded, turning her car off. "But it's pretty cold out, is it warm in the barn?"

Paige couldn't believe her ears; she actually said yes, to her; of all the people in the world Emily said yes to _her_.

"Yeah, it's warm in there; I'll just bring them in, it's their dinnertime anyway." Paige replied with a huge grin across her face.

And with that, they both trudged to the barn as Paige called in the horses; who of course didn't need much persuading considering the small amount of grass there was to eat.

* * *

As they entered the barn, all four horses were lined up in their stalls; one by one Paige fed them their hay and grain for the day. Emily stood back and watched as she took care of these large, dependent animals. It intrigued her just how much love she saw in Paige's eyes for these large creatures; she hoped one day Paige would look at her in the same way as well (minus the bestiality part of course.)

As Paige finished feeding the horses, Emily couldn't help but fall even more in love with her.

"Well, that's done; now they are pretty much preoccupied and don't really care much for anything else but you can pet them if you'd like. The one on the far left is Joey, then Snazzie, then Cowboy, and finally Twister on the far right."

Emily, to be honest, wasn't the least bit interested in the horses; the only thing she could think of was Paige. But Paige obviously wanted her to like them, so she went along with it and greeted each individual horse with a pat on the neck.

"They're so beautiful, Paige." Emily said, but really she was just talking about Paige; _she_ was beautiful.

"Yeah, I know. Hey, it's getting kinda chilly, wanna go inside and grab something to eat or drink?" Paige asked, hoping Emily would accept her kind yet awkward offer.

"I'd love to." Emily replied.

* * *

The two girls entered the large, white house and immediately Emily felt relief from the bitter cold wind that had begun to blow.

Paige's house was filled with a welcoming aroma that filled your senses as soon as you walked inside. To the left, was the dining room, which was just adjacent to the kitchen down the hall. To the right was the living room, complete with a plasma screen TV and an "L" shaped couch and coffee table. Just ahead was a flight of stairs leading to, most likely, the master bedroom and Paige's bedroom. The entire flight of stairs was lined with family portraits and copies of famous works of art. The walls were all white with the exception of the living room, which was a light brown.

"Want anything to eat or drink?" Paige asked.

"No thanks, I'm good." Emily replied. All she really wanted was to hang out with Paige, but she didn't want to make her uncomfortable like the other girls did. She just wanted Paige to come to her, like she did when she asked to see her horses.

"Well, you wanna watch TV or something?" Paige asked.

"Sure, what do you like to watch?" Emily asked, walking towards the living room.

"Actually that TV doesn't work." Paige lied. "The only one that works right now is the one in my room. The cable is being weird down here and we're trying to get it fixed." She lied again. She really just wanted an excuse to have Emily in her room. A girl; a girl like Emily in her room.

"Oh, alright, lets go to your room then." Emily replied, heading up the stairs, thanking the Gods that she is going to end up in Paige's room, on her bed, with _her_.

* * *

They entered Paige's room. It was Mint green and there were multiple framed drawings of horses hanging up on all four of the walls. She had a queen sized bed, which Emily thought was nice. Her dresser was white and scattered on it were swimming medals, trophies, ribbons and pictures of her, some from when she was young, and some from maybe just a year ago.

She also noticed a second sketchbook; apparently Paige had a thing for drawing. Emily walked over, picked it up, and started flipping through it. She noticed that the drawings were a little different; they were just of a bunch of random women in different positions. No horses, no settings, no animals, no nothing but these women; they weren't provocative at all, they were just random positions. Sitting, standing, reading, walking, running, crying, sleeping, etc.

Paige noticed Emily's curiosity and grabbed the book away from her, as if she was embarrassed that she saw them. She placed it in her desk drawer and shut it.

"Hey, those were really good." Emily said, trying to ease her embarrassment as much as possible. It didn't seem to help though, because she quickly changed the subject back to their original plan.

"Here's the remote. Pick anything you like." Paige persuaded, handing Emily the remote.

Emily reluctantly turned it on and decided to flip to Animal Planet; figuring that's what Paige liked to watch as well. Animal Cops Houston was on a rerun and they both settled into Paige's bed and just laid there for a while, in silence.

After the 3rd rerun, Emily had received a text from her mom, wondering where the hell she was because she wasn't at practice.

"Oh, shit," Emily thought. "I'm dead." It was going on 9 o' clock and Emily had to be home by 8.

"Hey, Paige," Emily said, "I have to go, that was my mom."

Sitting up, Paige smiled and pushed the hair out of her face, for she had been half asleep.

Emily stood up and started to walk out, but when she got to the door, she turned around and said, "Hey, you're a really good artist. I can tell what you're interests are; and I think we share the same ones."

Paige just sat there, staring at her, looking as though she was caught in some sort of lie.

"We both like horses." Emily said, as she turned around and walked out the door.


	5. Chapter 5

**Alright, for starters, I know the last chapter may have seemed a little off, but hopefully this one will be a little better; I wasn't really in the greatest mindset when I wrote it so I apologize for that. But on the contrary, I wrote all of chapter 2 while I was half asleep and it turned out pretty good for writing while drowsy. **

**Secondly, in light of the last chapter, hopefully this one will answer most, if not all your questions about Paige and why she is the way she is.**

**I would like to thank all my lovely followers, reviewers, etc. for letting me share my thoughts with you. If it wasn't for soapyraindrops, I would have never started writing this story, so a special thanks to her as well. **

**One last thing, all the teacher names, including Mr. Dyck, are my actual teachers; I didn't make any of them up. Therefore, yes, I do have a teacher named Mr. Dyck, and yes, he is my Chemistry teacher... **

**On that note, here is Ch. 5. **

**Enjoy!**

**P.S. Trigger warning: self harm. It doesn't go into detail, but it is mentioned.**

* * *

The obnoxiously loud noise of Emily's alarm clock roused her from her sleep as she fumbled in the darkness to turn it off. She had the absolute worst night of sleep that she could remember ever having before; all she did was toss and turn in her bed, mind racing constantly. Not even her mom's sleeping pills that she took at 1:00 AM helped her to fall asleep. There was no plausible explanation for her insomnia except Paige; Paige freaking McCullers would not leave her thoughts for a second. She had absolutely no idea just how someone, someone whom she had just met a few days ago, could have this sort of impact on her life. First her GPA, now this; this had to stop somehow, some way, she had to make everything about this girl leave her mind, but how?

Slowly, Emily arose from her bed, wiping the crusty tears from her eyes as she stood up and walked to the bathroom for her usual morning routine. She really had no desire to go to school, considering how much sleep she didn't get, but knew that she had to push herself through the day knowing how important it would be for her to keep her grades up in order to be able to swim against the Lady Warriors on Saturday.

Emily returned to her room, feeling a little better now that she had been up for a while, but still knowing that the day ahead was going to be miserable. The only thing that kept her spirits up was the fact that she would see Paige today, and that was a bonus, right?

It was now 7:00 and Emily walked downstairs to make her usual breakfast of champions: toast, eggs, sausage and orange juice. Luckily though, her mom read her mind and had already begun making breakfast earlier so it was all ready to eat by time Emily arrived downstairs.

"Morning Emily, I made your favorite." Pam said with a smile. Emily had no clue how someone could be this cheerful so early in the morning.

"Morning mom, thanks, you really know how to treat me well, don't you?" Emily said, half jokingly, knowing full well that she was lucky to have such an amazing mom like her. Although there was that one time she wasn't so proud of her with the way she reacted when she came out, but that was in the past and now she's come a long way since then.

Walking outside, Emily noticed the newly formed snow on the ground; about two inches had fallen since last night. The sunrise made it shimmer so beautifully that, despite the cold, she paused to take in the sight for a minute, before climbing into her vehicle and driving off to school.

* * *

When she arrived, Emily was met by an overly eager Hanna: "Oh my God," Hanna complained, "does the school realize how bad the roads are? I almost died on the way over here!"

"Are you sure it's roads, and not the driver? Because I made it here just fine." Emily replied, knowing Hanna was just being her overly dramatic self, which was to be expected.

"Okay, fine. Whatever," Hanna whined, "lets just get to class; the sooner we get there, the sooner I can skip after lunch."

Emily gave her a look of disappointment, to which Hanna replied with a look of "I'll do it regardless of whether or not I have your approval."

They continued down the hallway to their first class; Emily couldn't wait for this day to be over.

* * *

As the day rolled on, Emily's thoughts were almost always on Paige. She was so transfixed on her own thoughts that she could barely concentrate what the others were talking about during lunch. All she could make out was Hanna talking about how she is going shopping after lunch and that she tried to convince Caleb to go with her but, obviously, he refused. Spencer was going on about how she "failed" the Calculus test because she had gotten an A-, and how that just wasn't good enough for a Hastings. Aria was talking about how she had finally gotten a hold of Ezra and that they were going to dinner tonight to celebrate his book being published. All in all Emily admitted that at that given moment she couldn't care less about her friends lives that day; all she cared about was seeing Paige next period.

* * *

Emily suddenly felt giddy and wide awake as she strolled to Chemistry, not caring that she had a huge grin on her face that had made several people stare curiously at her. But her grin had immediately dissipated and turned into a huge look of disappointment as she eyed the two empty seats at her lab table.

Wh-what? She was gone, but why? She had seemed just fine when I left her last night. Could she have gotten sick that fast? Or was it because of me? Emily couldn't help but think Paige was avoiding her because of what she said last night, pretty sure that Paige had caught on to what she was implying when she said that they "both liked horses." Emily was devastated; she would have to continue the rest of the day worrying about how Paige was, what she was thinking, and why she wasn't at school.

* * *

Instead of heading to Athletic Conditioning, Emily had decided to go to the school nurse and lay down, complaining that she was not feeling good, which was the truth; she didn't feel good, but it was all in her head. She laid there for what ended up being the rest of the day, the school nurse waking her as the last bell had rung, signaling the end of the school day, and the beginning of what was to be a very long swim practice.

Emily headed in the direction of the natatorium, stopping at her last two classes of the day to collect any homework that she had missed. Her thoughts quickly went back to Paige. She had ultimately decided that she would stop by her house after practice and see how she was doing and why she had missed school today. Emily had hoped though it didn't seem too weird that she would visit her afterwards; she was just really worried about her.

* * *

Swim practice was especially worse than the school day; Emily could not for the life of her pull herself together to even beat the time of the worst swimmer on the team. About fifteen minutes into practice, Emily pulled herself out of the water only to be met by a very disappointed looking coach.

"Emily, I have no idea what is wrong with you today; it's pretty evident that you are unfit to even compete in the tournament on Saturday. If you keep this up, expect to be sitting on the bench that day."

"Coach wait," Emily pleaded as coach Fulton had turned and started to walk in the opposite direction, "today is just not a good day for me. I was unable to concentrate in all my classes and the last three periods I spent in the nurses office. I barely had any sleep last night and I was wondering if it would be alright if I left early in order to recharge for tomorrow; I should be back to normal by then."

Coach Fulton complied with Emily's request only if she promised to bring her "A" game for Saturday; which she did. Emily then headed towards the locker room and proceeded to change back into her street clothes. She then headed out towards her car and started in the direction of Paige's house.

* * *

When she arrived, Emily knocked on her front door, only to be greeted by a tall, gray-haired man.

"Oh, hi," Emily started, "I-I'm Emily Fields, a friend of Paige, and I was just wondering if she was here, considering she wasn't at school today." This seemed to catch the man a little off-guard as he stepped aside to let her in.

"She's up in her room." the tall man stated, "you're welcome to go up there if you'd like. It's the last door on the left."

Emily thanked him and proceeded to climb the stairs, towards Paige's bedroom. As she got there, she knocked on the door a couple times and opened it. The first thing she noticed was Paige, sprawled out across her bed, laying on her stomach, pencil in hand, drawing a picture, which Emily couldn't quite make out.

The noise startled Paige as she quickly closed her sketchbook and looked at Emily with a look that could only be described as a child getting caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

They stayed like that for a minute, staring at each other. Emily then broke the silence, expressing her concern for Paige.

"Hey..." she said, cautiously, "I-I noticed that you weren't in school today and I was a little worried."

Wow, what an understatement, Emily thought; but Paige just nodded gently, acknowledging Emily's concern for her well being. Paige's lack of words made Emily even more nervous, as she was starting to regret coming over in the first place.

"Well, umm... How.. how are you feeling?" Emily asked.

Paige hesitated, looked as though she was about to say something, but quickly changed her mind and just shrugged her shoulders. Emily wasn't sure why Paige had suddenly decided to stop talking to her, but it made her feel empty inside; Paige was just beginning to open up to her and she just had to screw it up with that horses comment of hers. She internally chastised herself for it, although she knew it would just make her feel even worse.

Emily cleared her throat nervously as Paige just sat there, on her bed, continuing to stare at her as if she was supposed to say something else, which she did.

"Well, ah... Will you be in school tomorrow by chance?" Emily knew she sounded desperate, but she didn't care at this point. Paige just looked at Emily for a few seconds, and a small smile tugged at the corner of her mouth as she nodded, indicating that she would most likely be attending school the next day. Emily felt relieved, thinking that she didn't screw it up after all, maybe she just wasn't feeling too good this morning, much like herself.

"Good." Emily replied, "Well, glad to hear it. Oh, and by the way, you missed a lab today in chemistry but I finished it. Here." Emily handed the copy of the lab notes, plus the worksheet that was due the next day. Paige smiled a little more, leaning over to take the papers from Emily; their hands grazed slightly and Emily felt her breath hitch for a moment, hoping Paige wouldn't notice it. Luckily she didn't as she tucked the papers in her sketchbook.

"Well, it's probably time for me to head on out. I'm very glad to hear that you're alright; I'll see you tomorrow." And with that, Emily headed back towards the door, but as she was about to leave, she could hear the faintest "Thanks." coming from inside her room. Yes, I didn't completely screw this up; I still have a chance, Emily thought.

* * *

As Emily came down the stairs, she was greeted with the warm smile of, who she assumed was Paige's mother, considering the close resemblance.

"Hi, you must be Emily." she greeted, with a very familiar warm smile.

"Yes, hi. I'm so glad to meet you, Mrs. McCullers, right?" Emily knew she was right, but on the off chance that she was mistaken, she didn't want to make a fool of herself.

"Yeah, that's right. Hey, I just wanted to thank you for befriending Paige; she isn't very good at making friends and I'm just so happy that she found such a sweet girl like you to be around."

"Of course, no problem, Mrs. McCullers. Paige is really sweet, but not really one for talking much, is she?"

"No, not really. Actually, she was diagnosed with selective mutism when she was about five years old. It's not very common but it really affects her social life; see, she has the ability to speak, but when it comes to certain social situations, her anxiety gets to be so bad that she is physically incapable of speaking."

Emily was shocked to hear this; it made sense though, the way Paige acted around her and everyone else as well.

"Wow, that can't be fun to live with at all." Emily sympathized.

"No, it can't be; most of the time though she interacts with people by drawing them from a distance; which you've probably noticed by now since she is always carrying that sketchbook wherever she goes. So instead of talking to people, she draws them; it sort of fills the void of not actually physically interacting with them. But, if she does talk to you, you should feel lucky because it took her almost a year before she was even comfortable in a setting with more than five people. Which is why she had to transfer over to Rosewood, because the students there would always pick on her for being quiet, or they would think she's just being stubborn because she refuses to talk; but in reality, she just can't. It got really bad, so bad that we had started to notice a few cuts on her arm, and immediately we did what we thought was best; which was to transfer her. Luckily though, I believe that we have made a very good decision, considering she has already managed to make a friend." Mrs. McCullers said, with a smile that could melt anyone's heart.

Emily was deeply moved by Paige's backstory, she couldn't for the life of her even begin to imagine what life must be like for her; to be looked down upon because of a mental disorder that nobody understood, and therefore rejected her as an outcast. Emily sorta understood what it was like to be an outcast, but not like this. At least she could _hide_ who she was; Paige couldn't.

Emily felt tears welling up in the corners of her eyes; she knew that if she didn't leave now she would become a giant mess of tears in the McCullers' household, which was the last thing she wanted. Quickly, she thanked Mrs. McCullers for sharing that information with her, and made a promise to her that she would stay by Paige's side, regardless of the circumstances, which obviously had touched her as well as Emily could see tears welling up in Mrs. McCullers' eyes as well.

Emily left the McCullers' residence feeling much needed relief, as she walked towards her Toyota. Climbing in, she felt the tears that had welled up in her eyes fall across her cheeks as she drove home; determined to keep her promise to Mrs. McCullers. Not only for her sake, but for Paige's as well.


	6. Chapter 6

**This chapter took longer than expected and I apologize for that, but it's the longest one so far and I hope you all enjoy it! **

**P.S. The movie I mention later in the chapter I highly recommend watching if you haven't already seen it :)**

The crowd roared as Emily surged effortlessly through the water; as she touched the wall, she was lifted out of the pool by her teammates as they congratulated her for helping the Sharks defeat the Warriors in record time.

"Way to go Emily!" Hanna shouted through the rest of the audience. Clearly, Emily knew she had the most supportive friends she could have ever hoped for, especially Hanna.

Coach Fulton made her way towards the star anchor and gave her a congratulatory side-hug. "I knew you could do it today! It was just all a matter of will power."

"Thanks coach, I appreciate it." Emily returned, with a wide smile. To her, it was just another meet, but to the coach, it was about bragging rights and setting records, whether coach liked to admit it or not.

Emily waited for the team to go back towards the lockers as she eyed Paige, who was waiting behind the rest of the team to individually congratulate Emily on her new record. Emily made her way towards Paige and Paige made her way towards Emily; they met each other with a tight embrace that, frankly, neither one of them wanted to let go of.

"That was amazing. You, were amazing." Paige complimented as she let go of Emily.

"Hey, that was nothing, what about you? Didn't you set a record as well? Also, you gave us such a good lead in the beginning, it pushed everyone else to do their best; so really, it's _you_ who we should be thanking, not me." Emily replied.

"Thanks. I try." Paige said jokingly, even though she knew Emily meant what she had said; she liked to be considered such an important part of the team, regardless of how well the other girls performed.

During the last few days, Paige had gradually become more open to Emily, and a few other people, but mostly just Emily. They exchanged numbers and became fast friends. By Saturday, the fact that Paige suffered from selective mutism, was completely irrelevant because of how comfortable she began to feel around her. Paige liked the fact that she and Emily became so close so quickly, something like that had never happened to her before and she figured she could definitely get used to it.

Both girls headed towards the locker rooms. As they entered, they noticed that most of the other girls had already changed and left. Neither of them were in a hurry, so they both took their time gradually changing back into their street clothes. Emily, like always, sneaked a few peeks at Paige's abs and asked herself how someone could manage to be so in shape. Coach turned the corner to where they were after they had changed and told them that Monday's practice is optional for them because of how well they had performed today. Most likely though, they would both show up anyways considering that they both took swimming very seriously and wanted to get in as much practice as they possibly could.

"Hey, are your parents here or do you need a ride home?" Emily asked, hoping for an excuse to give Paige a ride.

"Actually my parents' business trip got canceled so they were able to come today."

Emily couldn't help but feel a little disappointed, but she knew it was better this way because Paige's parents were able to come and support her. "Oh, alright. Are we still on for tomorrow then?"

"Yeah, I already have the homework done but you are more than welcome to come over if you don't understand it. Chemistry can be a bitch sometimes."

"I couldn't agree more." Emily replied, lifting her duffel bag over her shoulder. "What time should I come over?"

"Oh, it doesn't really matter as long as it's not before noon or like super late or anything. Just get there when you get there I guess. My parents know you're coming."

"Alright, I'll see you tomorrow then."

"See ya."

* * *

Emily walked outside the locker rooms, where her posse was waiting for her.

"Emily, you were amazing out there!" Hanna exclaimed.

"Yeah, I know. I heard you over everyone else. Thanks by the way, for coming and everything. It means a lot, you know?"

"No problem Em," Spencer added, "and that's not all. How does a small party at your house sound? We brought cake and we can grab some ice cream on the way."

"So wait, you knew I would win, so you bought me cake? You guys really know how to make a girl feel special." Emily thanked.

"Hey, why don't you invite Paige, I believe she would enjoy cake and ice cream as well." Aria added.

"Well, I would, but Paige is with her parents and she really isn't much for social occasions. I'll bring some cake over with me tomorrow though, if there's any left. I'm going over to her house and she's going to teach me chemistry."

"Ah, I see." Hanna teased, "She's going to teach you _chemistry_, eh?"

"Not like that, Hanna. It's nothing like that actually." Emily lied, well, at least it wasn't true for _her_.

By that time Emily's mom came into view as she enveloped Emily in an excited hug.

"Oh my gosh, darling, that was amazing! I'm so proud of you and I'm sure if your dad were here he would be just as happy as I am right now." Pam exclaimed.

"Yeah mom, I know." Emily said, returning the hug.

"So, what do you girls have planned for the rest of the day?" Pam asked.

"Actually, they were hoping to come over and celebrate with cake and ice cream." Emily asserted.

"Ah, well alright then. You girls are welcome to come over. Do any of you need a ride?"

"No, we all came with Spencer." Hanna answered.

"Well, in that case, I'll see you girls at the house." Pam stated, walking towards the front doors. "Bye."

"Alright," Spencer proposed, "since you're the big winner, you get to pick your choice of ice cream for the party. Personally, I prefer cookie dough, but it's whatever."

"I'm good with cookie dough. How about you guys?" Emily asked, to which they all agreed upon.

"Alright, let's boogie." Hanna said, strutting towards the front doors. The three others followed, chuckling at Hanna's comment.

* * *

After the party, the four girls settled into the living room to watch a movie. Ultimately they decided on a Disney classic, Mulan. That is, after they said they would watch anything as long as it wasn't Rudy, again. The nostalgia filling the room made the time pass quickly; before they knew it, they had watched Mulan, The Little Mermaid, Aladdin and Cinderella. It was around 9 o'clock when everyone left; they said their goodbyes and Emily headed up to her room to get ready for bed. But before she laid down, Emily decided to try and tackle the homework assignment for chemistry, but she failed to understand it. Thank goodness Paige is willing to help me tomorrow; if it weren't for her I'd be failing this class, she thought.

Emily covered up and turned her radio on the lowest volume at around 10 o'clock that night, thankful that tomorrow she would see Paige again. Her thoughts were still on Paige as she drifted off into a deep slumber.

* * *

Emily awoke the next morning around 9:30 from a text from Hanna.

_Hey, Em, the girls and I are going to lunch today around 11:30 at the Brew, care to join? -H_

Emily was surprised to see how late she had slept in; normally she sleeps a regular eight to nine hours and her body wakes her up. It was probably because of the swim match that had left her feeling extra tired, she thought. Throwing the covers off and exposing her tan skin to the cool air, she grabbed her phone and replied back.

_Hey, I'd be glad to join you guys. I'll meet you there in a couple hours :) -E_

Emily was glad she could spend time with her friends that day in order to help the time pass by quicker; the sooner she got there, the sooner she could see Paige.

Emily took her morning shower and put on a decent pair of jeans and a shirt with a flannel jacket to put over it. She wasn't sure if she should just leave early and wait for her friends, or if she should find something else to do in order to occupy her for the next hour. With that, Emily hiked down the stairs into the living room and headed towards the kitchen to see if her mom had any chores for her to do.

"Hey, mom, is there anything you need me to do before I leave today?"

"Um, no not really. If you want to finish the dishes that would be great, but other than that I can't think of anything else. Just enjoy the day I guess; don't get into any trouble and be home by dinner."

"Alright, thanks mom." Emily was glad her mother let her have so much freedom; most teenagers aren't as lucky as she is. After finishing the dishes, Emily hiked back up the stairs, grabbed her bookbag, flung it over her shoulder, grabbed her jacket and headed out the door. She tossed her bookbag in the passenger seat, started the car, and drove off to the Brew.

Upon arriving, Emily noticed she was about twenty minutes early. She waited in her warm car for about ten minutes, listening to the radio; then she noticed Spencer's car pulling up and Emily turned her car off to go meet up with them.

"Hey, you're here early." Spencer said, climbing out of the drivers seat.

"Well yeah, so are you. But that doesn't matter, all I know is I'm starved; I didn't have any breakfast this morning."

"Well that's unusual," Aria added, "the great Emily Fields skipping out on breakfast?"

"Yeah, yeah, I was going to eat this morning but I figured if I did then I wouldn't be hungry now. Anyways, who's buying?" Emily joked. The four girls laughed as they entered the Brew, all but Emily sat down at their usual spots; Emily ordered their usual meals and brought it back to them.

The time passed quickly as the four girls shared many different stories, jokes, and memories. Before they knew it, they had finished eating and it was already going on 2 o'clock.

"Hey, I think I'm going to take off," Emily stated, "it's been fun, I'm glad you guys invited me."

"Oh, no problem Em," Hanna replied, "here, take some of the leftover pie, it's the last thing I need lingering in my fridge."

"Thanks," Emily said as she took the pie from Hanna, "I'll see you guys later."

* * *

Arriving at Paige's house, Emily stepped out of her car, pie in hand and bookbag over shoulder, as she prodded through the Pennsylvania snow. Emily knocked on Paige's door; a few seconds passed as she was then greeted by the warm smile of Mrs. McCullers.

"Oh, hi Mrs. McCullers, is Paige here?"

"Oh, yeah, she's here but she's out in the barn. You can put your stuff down here though and go get her if you'd like. I'll put the pie in the fridge too if you want."

"Alright, thanks." Emily uttered, setting her bookbag inside by the front door and handing the leftover pie to Mrs. McCullers. "I'll be back in a bit."

Emily traversed towards the barn; upon reaching it, she noticed Paige next to her horse, Joey. It seemed as though she was carrying on a conversation with him. As she approached further, she could just make out what she was saying.

"No, buddy, that's not how you talk to strangers... Yeah, I know, but it's really impolite and you should know better, you're going on seven years old now... Hey, don't give me that tone, I might just have to beat it out of you..."

Emily couldn't help but stand there in awe as she heard Paige actually carry on a conversation with Joey. It seemed almost surreal for some reason, and she couldn't get enough of it.

"Joey, for the last time, I will not do that. I understand how badly you want me to and that you're just thinking of me but it would do more harm than good and we both know what could happen. I'm not losing the most important person in my life right now, so just drop it."

Emily couldn't believe what she was hearing. Was she talking about _her_? What was it that "Joey" wanted her to do? And how bad could the reaction be that Paige was thinking about? Just then, Emily felt a nudge on her shoulder; apparently Twister, whom she hadn't even noticed until now, wanted some attention. He whinnied and that caught Paige's attention as she was now looking over in Emily's direction.

"Oh, hey. W-when did you get here?" Paige asked nervously.

"Oh, just like a minute ago. I was listening to you and Joey and I was just thinking that I had no idea that you were some sort of Dr. Doolittle." Emily joked, hoping to relieve some of Paige's embarrassment, which seemed to work, a little.

"Oh, well, anyways, I was just about to head back up to the house. Care to join me?"

"Sure. By the way, I just got done having lunch with the girls and I brought back some banana cream pie."

"Oh good, that's my favorite kind." Paige said, smiling. Emily was thankful she was able to change the subject; she couldn't bear making Paige upset and not speak to her like she did the last time she was over. They continued up the path and entered the large house; Emily grabbed her bookbag, kicked off her shoes, and followed Paige up to her room. She, of course, couldn't help but stare at her ass the whole way up; it was just too perfectly shaped not to though, she thought.

As they entered Paige's room, Emily tossed her bag by the bed as she sat down next to Paige, who was grabbing her bookbag as well. Paige lifted her bag to where it was sitting in front of her as she emptied all the contents out of it; which included her chemistry book, calculus book, notebook, and sketchbook. Emily grabbed her chemistry book along with her notebook as she opened to the page that was assigned. Paige did the same.

"Okay, so I'm stuck on question seven, polyatomic ionic compounds make no sense to me at all."

"Okay, first of all, what's the charge of NH4? Also known as ammonium."

"See, that's what I don't understand, how do you know that?"

"There's a list of them on page 316, didn't you listen when he told us that on Friday?"

"Well..." Emily knew why she hadn't noticed a single thing that the teacher was saying on Friday, she was too busy staring at Paige the whole damn time. "I might have been in my own little world for most of the class period."

"I understand, but now that you know where to find them does it all make sense? Because as long as you know the charges you know how many goes with which one because it's just simple math from here on out. The names may be a little tricky but you'll be able to get it in no time as long as you practice them." Paige had literally solved her entire problem right then and there but she knew she didn't want to leave sooner than she had to.

"Yeah, I think I understand it now. But just for good measure is it alright if I just do this here and if I have any more questions I'll just ask?"

"Yeah, that's fine. Hey, I'm going downstairs to grab a drink, want anything?"

"No thanks, but you can bring up the leftover pie. Your mom said she would put it in the fridge for me when I got here."

"Alright, will do." Paige then walked out of the room and down the stairs to the kitchen. When she got back, she was carrying a water bottle, the leftover pie, and two forks. Emily was making pretty fast progress on the homework now that Paige had cleared up that one little detail. Emily took a small break and finished the leftover pie with Paige, who had already eaten most of it on the way back up.

"Couldn't wait, could you?" Emily teased.

"Hey, you're the one that left me alone with it, so you have no one to blame but yourself." Paige joked.

"Well I wasn't that hungry anyways, lunch with the girls pretty much filled me all the way up."

"Good, now get that homework done so we can find something else to do. That is..." Paige paused, "if you still want to be here when you're done."

"Sure, I'd like that. I'm almost done, just give me about ten more minutes."

Emily finished her homework while Paige caught up with her book for English; they both weren't sure what to do now but neither one wanted Emily to leave.

"So, what would you like to do? I have movies, an xbox, a playstation, and a laptop."

"Hmm... You pick."

"How does a movie sound? I've got plenty on the bookshelf over there. Most of them are older but some are pretty good. I've got Racing Stripes, Spirit, Black Stallion, an array of old Disney movies, Finding Nemo, Sister Act, Rudy..."

"Did you just say you have Rudy?" Emily interrupted.

"Um, yeah, it's right over there. I take it you like that movie, huh? Here, I'll put it in." Paige said, walking towards the bookshelf. She fumbled through the array of disks as she finally found the one that said "Rudy" and grabbed it. She took the movie out and placed it in the dvd player.

"I grew up on this movie. It's one of my favorites." Emily stated, leaning back on Paige's bed. Paige climbed in beside her holding the remote.

"Yeah, same here. It's not too bad. But I like Sister Act better."

"I've never seen Sister Act, what's it about?"

"It's about this lounge singer in Reno who's ex-boyfriend tries to kill her and she has to go undercover in witness protection as a nun. It's really funny, it's got Whoopi Goldberg in it. It's older but still amazing."

"Sounds interesting, can we watch it later? Like after Rudy?"

"Sure, no problem."

Both girls laid silently on the bed watching Emily's favorite movie. When it was over, Paige placed it back in it's case and grabbed Sister Act from the shelf.

"Hey, I'm going to put this in and then I'm going to use the restroom real quick, be back in a sec."

"Alright, I'll be here then, waiting." Emily said, smiling, which made Paige blush slightly. Emily was glad to be able to just hang out and watch movies with Paige, but she still wasn't sure how Paige _really_ felt about her; she was receiving so many mixed signals from this girl it was ridiculous. Emily then noticed Paige's sketchbook still sitting on the bed, and, as always, her curiosity had gotten the better of her as she leaned forward and opened it to her most recent project. What she found was beyond anything she was prepared for; it was an intricate drawing, much like the others, of chemistry class. But what was weird was everything was in black and white, including every single other one of Paige's drawings, but this particular drawing was of _herself, _and not just that, but the background was still in black and white, but she was drawn _in color_. This definitely threw Emily for a loop as she tried to understand just why Paige decided to do something like that. Were her original thoughts true? Did Paige like her just as she liked Paige? This has to mean something, it's not just a coincidence.

Emily was so distracted by her thoughts that she didn't hear Paige entering the room, only to find her searching through her drawings.

"W-what are you doing?" Paige asked, sternly. This definitely caught Emily's attention as she looked in the opposite direction, finding a shocked, and somewhat angry looking Paige. "Why are you going through my stuff?"

"I-I... was just looking. I kn...know how good you are at drawing and I was just curious..." Emily trailed off, only to be interrupted by Paige.

"Well, you shouldn't be doing that! That shit's personal." Paige flustered, grabbing the book from Emily.

"I'm.. I'm sorry Paige, I..."

"No, you're not. Otherwise you wouldn't have done it! Now, just leave. And take your stuff with you."

"Bu.. but I'm sor.."

"Just. Go." Paige stated, harshly. Emily couldn't believe just how fast this night went from perfect, to a complete disaster. She was beginning to realize just how curiosity really killed the cat; it left the cat with no friends and he died sad and lonely, which is exactly how she felt as this very moment.

Emily stood there, dumbfounded as Paige removed the movie from the dvd player and placed it back in it's case.

"Aren't you leaving?" Paige questioned.

"Y-yeah..." Emily responded quietly, "s..sorry." Although it was barely audible, Paige heard her loud and clear as she grabbed her things and headed out the door.

On the brink of tears, Emily hurriedly shuffled downstairs cautiously as to not bump into Mrs. or Mr. McCullers; she couldn't bear to face them after what had just happened. She slipped her sneakers on and pulled her jacket over her other jacket as she opened the door and left.

On the way home she couldn't help but let the tears fall freely across her face. Man, I really blew it this time, she thought. When she arrived home, she avoided seeing her mother as she rushed upstairs and locked her door, with tear stains across her face. Emily didn't bother to change or even take her shoes off as she crawled into bed and cried herself to sleep.


	7. Chapter 7

**All I have to say is writing this chapter gave me so many feels I had to stop occasionally to keep from crying. But that's just me, probably won't have the same effect on you, but who knows, right? **

**Thank you, thank you, thank you to anyone and everyone who reads, reviews, follows and/or favorites my story. You guys rock, seriously. I love you with all my heart :D **

**Well, I guess I'll stop typing this and let you go on with your reading. Enjoy!**

* * *

Mondays have to be the worst days ever invented, Emily thought, reaching across her bed to turn off her alarm clock. Her room was quiet afterward, only the sound of Emily's own heartbeat could be heard. Her thoughts were immediately brought back to the previous night and what had happened. How could she have been so stupid, so idiotic as to think it would be alright to just grab someone's belongings and go through them; the thought had never occurred to her before, so why then?

Emily sat up; by this time she remembered how she hadn't changed out of her clothes or even taken her shoes off last night. All she cared about right now was not feeling miserable, which was completely out of the question.

Climbing out of bed, Emily removed her shoes and jacket. As she stood up, she noticed her head was throbbing almost to an unbearable extent. Massaging her temples, she fumbled to the bathroom and opened the medicine cabinet; grabbing the bottle of Aleve, she popped two in her mouth and swallowed them down with a Dixie cup full of sink water. She managed to stumble back to bed and let out a loud moan as she fell face first into her pillow. There was no way she was going to school today. Maybe it was a blessing in disguise; she was nervous about seeing Paige today and she was pretty sure she still had not forgiven her for what she did. Maybe she never would.

Emily had fallen back to sleep a short time later, as she was awaken by her mother who had noticed Emily's car was still in their driveway.

"Hey, hon. Aren't you supposed to be leaving for school about fifteen minutes ago?"

Emily could only manage to let out a soft moaning sound, which had been enough to convince Pam that her daughter wasn't feeling good since she had always forced herself through the day even when she wasn't feeling the greatest. Hell, she even went to school with a fever one day just so she could swim at a meet later on; which turned out to be a terrible disaster considering swimming with the flu won't necessarily produce your best time.

"Alright, I'll call the school and tell them you're not feeling well today."

Emily let out a muffled "thanks," but her mom still couldn't make out what she had said.

"Ok, well you just feel better, alright? I'll make you some soup later."

Pam leaned in and gave Emily a motherly kiss on her head and shut the door behind her as she left. It didn't take long before Emily fell back asleep.

* * *

Emily awoke around 11:30 to a text from Hanna.

_Yo, Em. Where are you? You do realize it's a Monday right? -H_

Emily figured now would be a good time to get up and start the day; she sat up in her bed and noticed that her headache must have dissipated throughout the course of her slumber. She wasn't sure whether or not to thank the sleep or the Aleve; regardless, she was grateful. She sat up and replied to the text.

_Felt awful this morning. Terrible headache. Stayed home. -E_

Emily stood up, placed her phone in her pocket, and headed downstairs. Her hair was messy and her breath smelled awful but she couldn't care less; all she wanted was her soup that she could tell her mom was making by the smell that was emanating from downstairs.

"Morning mother." Emily greeted with a smile.

"Hey sweetie, I can see you're feeling better now. Here, just in time because I just finished your favorite chicken soup for lunch."

"How many times have I told you that you're the best mom ever?" Emily said, sitting down at the kitchen table.

"Not enough," Pam joked, "now here, eat. I have some errands to run and I'm not sure when I'll be back so you'll have the entire house to yourself. Will you be okay here by yourself?"

"Aren't I always?" Emily answered, before blowing on her food to cool it down and placing it in her mouth. Pam grabbed her purse and keys and left out the door. Leaving Emily completely alone.

* * *

Emily showered after lunch and decided to spend the rest of the day watching movies in the living room. She had gathered up a few of her favorites and brought them down from her room. Well into her third one, Emily heard a knock on the door. She grabbed the remote, paused the movie, and peeked out the window; what she saw was not what she had expected to see. Emily walked to the front door, unlocked it, and pulled it open, only to see a nervous looking Paige standing on her doorstep. By the looks of it, it seemed as though she had been dropped off by Hanna, who was sitting in her car in the driveway.

"H-hey." was all she said.

"Hey. What... what are you doing here?" Emily asked, still trying to put the whole scenario together in her head.

"Well..." she paused, as if trying to come up with something to say, "for starters I wanted to see if you were alright. I noticed you weren't at school and I was worried. Hanna said that you weren't feeling well and I wanted to check on you. But mostly..." she paused again, this time stepping towards Emily and brushing past her to get inside her house. Paige had a more sincere look on her face as she continued, "but mostly I came to apologize, for last night."

Emily was taken aback by this; she couldn't believe that Paige was apologizing for _her_ mistake!

"No, no I'm the one who should be sorry. I shouldn't have looked through them and you had every right to be mad at me..."

"I had no right to yell at you though." Paige interjected, "And I would like to make it up to you. That is, if you're feeling well enough to go outside."

Emily couldn't believe it; not only was Paige apologizing, but she was also feeling sorry enough to think that she needed to make her _feel_ better. If Paige wasn't perfect enough already, Emily thought.

"Well, you don't have to..."

"I want to." Paige interrupted, looking serious as ever. "Are you up to it today?"

"Well, I'm not exactly sure what we're going to be doing. But I guess so."

"Good. Just make sure you dress warm." Paige said, eying Emily's lazy outfit for the day, "Really warm."

Smiling, Emily couldn't help but wonder what was floating around in Paige's mind, but she didn't really care at the moment, considering the fact that Paige had not only forgiven her, but felt just as much in the wrong as she herself did.

"Alright, just let me get dressed. Is Hanna going to be taking us or am I?"

"Hanna just dropped me off, she left already. So you will." Paige replied, smiling. Her smile though could have easily been mistaken for a slight smirk as well, but Emily ignored it and continued up the stairs to dress in the proper attire for whatever Paige had in mind.

* * *

"Okay, so what exactly _are_ we doing?" Emily inquired.

"You'll just have to wait and see. Keep your eyes on the road, I'd appreciate it if we make it back to my house _safely_." Paige smiled.

"You're a mystery, Paige. I like that." Emily smiled back.

* * *

When they arrived, Paige walked Emily out to her barn. Inside, Emily noticed all four horses confined in their stalls chewing on the fresh hay in their nets.

"Wait here." Paige said as she grabbed Joey's halter and opened his stall door. She led him out, walking towards a smaller section of the barn. Turning him around, she grabbed each cross-tie and clipped them to either side of his halter. By this time Emily had pretty much figured out what was about to happen.

"So, I take it you're going to ride Joey?" Emily asked.

"No, _you're _going to ride him. You've done this before haven't you?"

"Well, not exactly. I rode a few times when I was little but not by myself and definitely not with a horse this... big." Emily replied, admiring the tall animal in front of her. He had to have been at least seven feet tall when his head was held high. Right now though he held it about waist height and was smelling her coat pocket looking for any treats she may have. She had to admit that he was very magnificent and could tell why Paige loved these creatures so much. Joey was definitely beginning to grow on her.

"Well, then I guess you'll just have to ride with me then." Paige remarked, looking at Emily with that warm smile she loved so much. The thought of being on Joey with Paige comforted her; she was also glad that it gave her an excuse to sit so closely to her as well.

"I guess I will then." Emily smiled. Joey was still searching her pockets for anything that he could eat. He began nipping at her jacket with his lips in an attempt to see if he could maybe get anything out of them. Yes, Joey was definitely beginning to grow on Emily.

Paige grabbed a couple brushes from a bucket and handed one to Emily. They groomed Joey thoroughly from his head to his hooves and from his mane to his tail. Paige then went to the tack room and grabbed Joey's saddle. After successfully tightening the girth, she headed back and grabbed his bridle. She pulled it over his head and clipped it on, making sure it wasn't too loose or too tight. Satisfied, she unhooked the cross ties and led him towards the edge of the barn.

"You ready?" Paige asked.

"As ready as I'll ever be." she replied. And with that, Paige lifted one leg in the stirrup and hoisted herself into the saddle. Holding her hand out, she lifted Emily up behind her with all the strength in her arm. Emily tensed as their bodies became pushed together, merging into one. Instinctively, Emily's arms wrapped around her waist as Paige squeezed Joey into a walk and they left the barn.

Emily was content with her position as they continued down the path.

"So, where exactly are we going?" Emily asked.

"It's a surprise. You'll just have to wait." Paige answered. Emily couldn't help but chuckle at Paige's stubbornness; it was just too adorable.

"Alright, I trust you." Emily admitted, squeezing Paige's waist just a little tighter and resting her head on Paige's shoulder. With the rocking movements of Joey beneath them and with the position she was in, Emily admitted to herself that she could fall asleep like this and sleep like a baby.

They continued down the path in silence. Emily could feel the warmth illuminating from Paige's backside and it felt good; it felt right being like that. She couldn't help but think Paige was enjoying this just as much as she was. It wasn't because of a look on her face or anything like that, it was just more or less intuition, and she hoped she was right.

About ten minutes later, they approached a fork in the trail. Paige halted Joey.

"Which one?" Paige asked. This caught Emily by surprise; why on Earth is she asking _me_ where to go?

"Um, why are you asking me. Aren't you the one who knows this area?"

"Of course I do, and I know where each one leads. Now pick one."

Emily couldn't help but wonder why exactly she was doing this, but she decided to just go along with it.

"Go left, I guess."

"You guess?"

"Fine. Go left for sure." Emily replied.

"That's better." Paige remarked, squeezing Joey towards the left trail ahead. Emily hoped she picked the right one, but she wasn't quite sure if there _was_ a right one.

A few minutes later Emily couldn't help but ask:

"So, why am I drawn in color while everyone and everything else is in black and white?"

Paige chuckled, "I wondered how long it was going to take you."

"Well, I waited as long as I could. But it's been burning on the edge of my tongue ever since we got here."

"I understand. Just about another minute and we'll be there. I'll tell you then."

Emily couldn't argue with that.

* * *

The pathway eventually opened up to a small, open field. To the right was a small pond lightly iced over and covered with snow. There was a tree with a tire swing frozen in place, adjacent to the tree was a large boulder with a fairly flat top, perfect for sitting on. Just behind them was a rocky cliff, not too tall, but enough to not be able to see what's on top of it. To the left was the treeline that extended as far as the eye could see. Next to the treeline and behind the pond was an open field and a little farmhouse about a mile up the way. It was one of the most beautiful settings Emily had ever seen

"Wow." was all Emily could muster.

"Beautiful isn't it? I normally come here when I need to get away. Get away from school, people, life in general; just get away really."

"H-how did you find this place?"

"During the summer I have a lot of free time that I like to spend with Joey. The best way to do that is just ride until you get lost; he knows his way back home. I got lost one day, and I found this place. There wasn't always a trail here, ya know?"

"Well, then I guess it looks like I chose the right path then, huh?"

"Actually, both lead to the same place. I just wanted you to choose for the hell of it." Paige grinned widely. Emily responded with a playful smack on her stomach.

"Hey now, easy." Paige said, squeezing Joey back into a walk and heading towards the tree.

They arrived next to the tree and Paige motioned for Emily to dismount, which she did, followed by Paige. Paige led Joey next to the tree and wrapped the reins around a thin branch. She then proceeded to sit on the boulder next to it; Emily did the same.

"So, now tell me," Emily started, "why _did_ you draw me in color like that?"

Paige sighed, "Well, now that we're here, I guess that means I have to tell you then."

"Damn right it does." Emily stated. Paige couldn't help but chuckle at her interjection.

"Well, here it goes," Paige stated, her seriousness returning immediately, "basically, all my life, has been black and white; everything just seems so... unimportant, and meaningless. All my life I've been convinced that everyone's the same; that nobody has ever, or will ever care about me. My entire life I've believed that I'm unimportant, worthless, and meaningless to everyone and that I will amount to nothing. That is, until I met you." Paige paused, looking at Emily's reaction to her words was eating away at her, for she could see the tears well up in Emily's eyes as well as feel them well up in her own. She looked down, sniffed, and continued, her voice shaky, "when I met you I knew there was something different about you before you even said a word to me. I could sense it, and I was right. You showed me that there's hope; hope that someone, somewhere actually has it in themselves to like someone like me. Someone that I can truly see, and someone that can truly see me. Everything is black and white, meaningless, in my life, except _you_. And I've never been so happy, in fact, I think this is the only true happiness I've ever felt in my entire life. You, are the color I see, because I, am the color you see, even though the original is black and white, you see my true colors. At first it was scary, when you looked through my drawings because opening up like this to someone isn't really my strong suit; I was afraid that you would find out how I truly see you, so I snapped at you, because I was scared, very scared."

Emily couldn't take it any longer, for she enveloped Paige in a tight embrace and cried with her. She had never expected something like this from Paige in a million years, it was the most amazing yet terrifying feeling that she felt as she let Paige rest her head against her shoulder; Paige had just spilled everything right then and there and she couldn't have been more unprepared for it. All she could do was hold her, hold her until she didn't want to be held anymore. So she did.

After a few minutes, Paige's tears were beginning to let up as she lifted her head off of Emily's shoulder and made eye contact. A small smile tugged at the corner of Paige's lips as she tried to force herself to cheer up as fast as possible because she hated the feeling of being so vulnerable. Emily moved her hand up to Paige's cheek in order to wipe the tears away from her face. Her hand stayed there and slowly, she moved it back towards the nape of Paige's neck and gently pulled her towards her. It was now or never. Emily eyed Paige's lips and closed the gap between them. At first Emily had been so shocked by her sudden moment of courage that she forgot what she was trying to accomplish; but she was soon reminded by the feel of Paige's lips moving against her own. Together they stayed that way, their lips brushing against one another slowly and passionately. After a few moments, they parted; breathless, Emily rubbing her thumb against Paige's flushed cheek.

"You mean like those true colors?" Emily asked.

Paige chuckled, "Yeah, those true colors."

They both stayed there and laughed for a bit; as their laughter died down, they realized just how cold they actually were and that it was probably time to head back to the house.

"Hey, it's getting kinda chilly, you ready to head back? I can make us some hot chocolate when we get back to my place."

"That sounds wonderful." Emily said, smiling. Paige sat up, grabbing the reins and unraveling them. She climbed on Joey's back and helped Emily up as well. Emily immediately wrapped her arms around Paige and held her tightly. Paige responded by putting one hand on Emily's forearm while the other held the reins to steer Joey back in the direction of the house.

"I could get used to this." Emily commented, resting her head on Paige's shoulder and stroking the sides of her stomach with her thumbs. Paige responded by squeezing Emily's forearm.

"Me too."


	8. Chapter 8

**I'm so sorry for the almost-three-week-hiatus but the story just hasn't been flowing like it has been and I apologize greatly for that. But here it is, Ch 8 as you have all been waiting for :) If this chapter sucks then I am really sorry but hey, I tried. Well anyways, I hope you enjoy it and please review it as well; I absolutely LOVE every single review I get from you guys. Seriously, you rock, all of you. If I haven't stated before, I'll do so now, I fully accept constructive criticism as long as it's _constructive._ **

**Oh well, I've kept you long enough. Please continue to enjoy and review. Hopefully Ch. 9 wont take quite as long...**

* * *

"Alright, I seriously believe that Mr. Misora is out to get me," Hanna complained, setting her fork down, "I worked my ass of on that video I made and I got a 70% because it didn't include EVERY single thing that was on the sheet I turned in. I mean, forgive me for coming up with something better later on. And the spit-take I added was priceless."

"You had absolutely no reason for that spit-take!" Spencer exclaimed, taking a sip of her apple juice, "It was placed in between the mall and the parking lot scenes."

"Hey," Hanna interjected, "you should have seen the price of those shoes they had in there! Talk about a rip off!"

"But there weren't any shoes in the video; you can't have a scene in a video based off of something that's not even in the video to begin with!" Spencer argued.

"Bu.. I.."

"Exactly." Spencer concluded, taking a bite of her half-eaten pizza. This entire conversation remained a blur to Emily, who was just beginning to snap back into reality.

"Are you alright, Em? You look kind of... distracted." Aria inquired. By now all three girls were focused on an obviously dazed Emily.

Emily, prior to being snapped back into reality, was reminiscing on her night with Paige; she _kissed_ her, and _she_ kissed her back. How she had managed to conjure up the courage to do that she wasn't sure, but she was glad she did. After her and Paige had arrived back at her place, they lead Joey back in his stall before heading back to the house to make some well needed hot chocolate. Though before she could finish drinking it, Emily's mom had text her saying she needed to be home to help with a few things and get dinner ready. They had left with an awkward goodbye, as Paige's parents were lounging in the living room right next to them. Before driving off, Emily had received a text from Paige telling her she had an amazing time today and that hopefully she could see her after school tomorrow as well; of course Emily said yes and proceeded to drive back home, with a smile perched across her face.

"Huh, w-what?" Emily asked, catching the eyes of her three friends.

"You were daydreaming, Em." Aria mentioned.

"Yeah," Hanna blurted, "probably about the new girl again haha; so tell us the deets!"

"Hanna, there probably aren't any 'deets' to be told. They've only known each other barely a week." Spencer interjected. Emily knew that only a week was enough time to get to know Paige well enough to kiss her, but she didn't want her friends to know, in fear of Paige not wanting to be outed; that would probably end up being a gradual process. Paige didn't seem like the "open" type, considering Emily's observations about her over the past week.

"There's nothing going on between us," Emily lied, hoping they wouldn't catch on to her fib, "we're just friends and she may or may not be gay anyways so why push the issue?"

"Well right now Hanna's the only one pushing anything." Spencer remarked.

"Okay, well excuse me for being curious about the non-existent love life of Emily Fields and wanting her to be with someone special." Hanna defended.

"It's alright, Hanna; I know your intentions are nothing but good. I just don't like you guys thinking that me being single is causing me to be unhappy, you know?"

"I know." Hanna replied, "I just feel like you are left out when it comes to relationships because we've got our hotties, and you're just, well, this lonely hottie in the background."

"Hanna!" Spencer chastised.

"What? I'm trying to be considerate of her situation!"

"Well you're doing a piss-poor job of it!"

"Guys," Emily interrupted, "really, I'm alright and so is Hanna. If it makes you feel any better I'll keep you up-to-date with Paige and I, okay?" Emily knew this was only half true, considering not wanting to 'out' Paige, but still true when it came to their friendship.

The bell rang, signaling the end of lunch and all four girls threw away their garbage and headed towards their designated classes. Emily arriving a little earlier than usual to Chemistry...

* * *

Strolling through the doorway to AP Chem, Emily's smile could be seen from space as she walked towards her lab partner who was smiling back at her. Emily sits down, her knee barely coming into contact with Paige's; neither of them moving from their positions.

"Hey, partner." Paige greets with a warm smile, her dark brown eyes never leaving Emily's.

"Hey, partner. Finish the homework? Because I didn't." Emily said with a chuckle, to which Paige returned and pulled out her finished assignment and laid it in front of Emily to copy down before class started. Emily was rather content with her relationship with Paige at the moment, although she still was unsure of what that kiss _really_ meant. Did this mean they were together? It seemed as though Paige was obviously in to her, but she still wasn't quite sure how Paige views their relationship as of right now. Her thoughts were interrupted when the bell rang and Mr. Dyck started handing back completed assignments while passing out a review assignment for the test tomorrow. Emily had just finished copying Paige's homework as the teacher came around and collected both of their sheets.

"Thank God there's nothing else included in this chapter, otherwise my brain would explode." Emily rejoiced, earning a slight chuckle from Paige.

"Well, I'd be more than happy to help but I refuse to let you cheat off of me on the test if that's what you were planning on doing, because that goes against my morals." Paige said, smiling, assuring Emily she was half joking about it.

"I wouldn't ask you to do that," Emily replied, "it goes against my morals too; but I feel as though the best I could do without your help is a C- or worse. If my GPA drops any lower I can't swim until it goes up again."

"Well, how about you do the entire review sheet by yourself, and I'll check your work; whatever you don't understand I'll help you with after school. How's that sound?"

"That sounds great, actually." Emily replied, "Hey, do you need a ride home after swim practice? If I'm going to your house then I figure we could just save your parents the time and effort, right?"

"Well, I was going to take the shuttle bus, but I guess we can do that." Paige replied, smiling as she began working on the review sheet in front of her. Emily took this as a sign that it was about time she worked on her review sheet as well, but the continuous contact between her and Paige's knees was pretty distracting. Thankfully though she was somehow able to work throughout the rest of the period.

Paige had finished her work early, so, as always, she pulled out her sketchbook and continued drawing a picture of Joey that she had already began the day before. Apparently, at about five minutes before the bell rang, Noel Kahn decided it was a good idea to come over and "introduce" himself.

"Hey there, girls," he began, traversing near the rear of the classroom, "how's that chemistry comin' along?" Both girls looked up from what they were doing; Emily scoffed at the thought of Noel coming over there, his intentions obvious: flirt with the new girl. Paige had looked up, and went straight back to working on her drawing when Noel tried to continue a conversation with them.

"Looks like you two are working hard; what's that? A horse? It's really good; hey, maybe you should be an art teacher or something." Emily scoffed again. Paige just continued to brush off his comments.

"Look, Noel," Emily started, "you and I both know why you're over here. Just shoo before you make a fool of yourself."

"Well, now, that's harsh, Emily." Noel remarked, "I hardly know what you're talking about; I just wanted to come over and introduce myself." Noel turned his attention towards Paige, who was now looking up at him. "Hi, I'm Noel Kahn. Captain of the varsity football team and I play a little soccer and lacrosse as well. And if you haven't heard I throw pretty awesome parties as well. There's one this Saturday at my parents' cabin if you would like to go. I'm sure Emily could show you where it is." He paused, looking towards Emily, and then back to Paige, "Well, anyways, I was just coming over here to let you know, if you need any help with anything, like schoolwork, or finding suitable friends..." his attention turned back towards Emily again, who was glaring at him, only to return his attention back to the auburn haired girl in front of him, "that I would be more than happy to assist you."

Emily really wanted the bell to ring soon; she wanted him to _leave_. But Paige's "are you kidding me?" look along with a slight chuckle at his statement was enough to shoot him down on the spot. "Well, alright then, I guess I'll take that as a 'get the hell away from me' and I'll just be on my way." He left them, and Emily couldn't help but smile at Paige's blatant rejection of Noel Kahn.

"Good thing his 'charm' didn't get to you." Emily stated, hoping that the reason for that was the same reason she had kissed her the other day.

"It's not too difficult to see what guys like him are really like, you know?"

"Yeah, I guess you're right." Emily returned. She had just finished the last problem of her review sheet and placed it in her folder. She looked at the clock and noticed there was about four minutes left of class and decided to utilize that time to admire Paige's artistic ability and leaned in closer to her, brushing against Paige's knee in the process. Emily noticed a smile spread across Paige's face as she continued to work on her drawing. Emily scoots closer, almost resting her head on Paige's left shoulder. She stayed in that position as the bell rang, signaling the end of 4th period.

* * *

Walking together, Paige and Emily headed towards the locker rooms. Emily was grateful for the fact that she and Paige were locker neighbors; getting to stand next to her and gawk at the perfectness that is Paige's abs, was too good to pass up.

"I hope coach doesn't work us too hard today before swim practice." Emily stated, grabbing her t-shirt and putting it over her head. Although she couldn't deny the fact she was interested in seeing Paige's body covered in sweat, she really didn't want a hard workout before practice.

"I agree," Paige admitted, closing her locker door, "it makes for bad swim times during practice. My dad wants me to be the anchor for the next meet but I highly doubt he'll get his wish. You're just too fast for me, Fields."

"Hey, I'm not the one breaking school records during the first practice, McCullers. You actually have a real shot. If you do make anchor, you will definitely deserve it." Emily replied, walking towards the gym.

"Thanks." Paige smiled, blushing slightly, and following behind Emily.

* * *

Throughout their gym period, Emily would find any excuse to come into contact with Paige, whether it be a high five, a brushing of their shoulders or hands, anything really. Coach had set up a lighter routine for the swimmers and other athletes competing in a winter sport, knowing that their usual workouts plus the hard routine for the rest of the class would be too much for them to handle. The routine consisted of twenty minutes of walking/jogging the indoor track and the rest of the period in the weight room doing the usual pushups, situps, and general use of the workout machines. Afterwords, Paige and Emily both went their separate ways and headed to the last period of the day.

Swim practice was routine and went by pretty fast. Although they were both pretty sore afterwords, they couldn't say that they didn't enjoy themselves while swimming. They both had a passion for it and that pretty much made up for whatever repercussions it had on their bodies.

They both met up at Emily's locker after swim practice. They grabbed their chemistry books and headed out towards Emily's vehicle. Once they arrived at Paige's house, they had found a note on the kitchen table stating that both her parents were out on business and will not be back until later that night or early the next morning. Emily couldn't deny the fact that she was glad they were out for the night; and neither could Paige.

They climbed the stairs and entered Paige's room and immediately made themselves comfortable on Paige's bed while pulling out their chemistry homework. Paige began looking over Emily's review sheet while showing Emily the problems she missed and why she missed them.

"Oh, that makes sense," Emily concluded, "so really all it was was I understood about 95% of it but because of that I would have missed small steps and gotten them wrong. So I understood it, but not quite fully."

"Yeah, you got the gist of it but it's those tiny steps that kill you in the end. Gotta watch out for those." Paige chuckled, earning a smile from Emily. Once she corrected her review sheet she put it back in her folder for tomorrow's test.

"Guess that was actually easier than I thought; where were you when I was taking AP Biology?" Emily joked

'Well, I was probably in this room right here and spending most of my time on my laptop surfing the internet or watching Sister Act. Which reminds me, we never finished watching that; you wanna watch it now? We got time. I mean, you finished the homework faster than I had anticipated."

"Oh, so I'm not as dumb as you thought I was?"

"No, I.. w-what I meant was..." Paige fumbled with her words.

"I'm just kidding, jeeze, man take a joke."

"Oh, ha... That's a relief." Paige mustered, "So, how 'bout that movie, eh?"

"Sounds good, wanna make some popcorn? Or do you have any?"

"Oh, we have popcorn, with extra butter and seasoning salt. I'll put the movie in and be right back."

Paige hopped off the bed and grabbed the movie from the shelf and slipped it in the DVD player.

"Make yourself comfortable and I'll bring up the popcorn in a bit."

Paige left the room and proceeded downstairs to the kitchen. Emily leaned back against the headboard and watched the previews as the smell of the freshly microwaved popcorn filled the house. Paige returned shortly with a bowl of popcorn and a couple bottles of water.

"I wasn't sure what you wanted, so I figured water was a safe bet." Paige said, switching the light off and heading back towards Emily. "It's alright if I have the light off, right?"

"Yeah, that's fine." Emily answered, internally thanking Paige for doing so. They settled in her bed just as the movie was about to start. They were close enough to be touching each others shoulders lightly, which didn't bother Emily one bit. They laid there, sipping their water and munching on the popcorn on Paige's lap. Emily took advantage of that and would occasionally brush her hand against hers while reaching for the popcorn.

By time the movie had ended, the popcorn was gone and their water bottles were empty. Their positions had changed to where Paige was now laying on her back and Emily was curled up next to her with her arm resting on Paige's stomach and Paige's arm around her and resting on her back. How they ended up that way, neither of them were sure how, or when it happened, but neither of them decided to question it. They laid there in silence as the credits rolled and the screen turned to black.

"Hey Paige..." Emily began.

"Hmm?"

"What exactly, _is_ this?" Emily asked, slightly lifting her thumb that was resting on Paige's abdomen.

"Well..." she began, "I was hoping you could tell me. This.." she paused, "...this is completely new territory for me."

"Same here." Emily answered. "Do your parents know? I mean you guys seem to share a lot considering their extensive knowledge about your school life and everything and how you, I guess, _deal_ with school and your classmates."

"Ha. If they knew they'd send me away to some 'gay away' camp or some shit like that. Honestly my parents don't give a shit about me or my mental health. As long as I have good grades and swim times, they couldn't care less whether or not I was a mess on the inside. They only make people think they do; once they're gone, it's a whole different world around here. Right now the only thing keeping me sane is staying busy and being with Joey." Paige answered. It appeared to Emily that Paige's life was a lot worse than she thought it was; and she was bound determined to help her get through it the best she could.

"I'm so sorry; when my parents found out I thought that would happen too, but as it turns out they were a lot more accepting than I first thought. But everyone's situation is different, I guess."

Paige nodded; a silence fell between them and Emily held Paige closer and in return Paige did the same. They laid there in silence for what seemed like an eternity, but was really only a few minutes before Emily continued.

"Hey, my friends know as well, would it be possible for you to tell them and have a larger support system? I know that helps a lot; it did when I first came out."

"Honestly, I really don't feel comfortable telling anyone at this point. It's not easy telling people you've only known a week. I'm surprised I even told you to be honest." Paige's voice fell, and a silence filled the room again.

"Well, I guess it can be our little secret for the time being; but eventually you will have to let people know, preferably starting with my friends. I know they will be 100% supportive of you, of _us_."

"Maybe..." Paige mustered, "I'll try."

"That's all I can ask for, Paige."Emily said, smiling. She looked up at Paige, who was looking down at her. Paige leaned down and captured her lips in a soft, sweet kiss.

"That's all I can ask for as well." Paige stated. And with that, they both drifted off into a deep slumber.


	9. Chapter 9

**Okay guys, I know you have all been waiting SUPER patiently for an update and I'm super excited to introduce the 9th chapter! From this point on, my story will be co-written by this amazing person who is super talented and just kinda awesome in general: Amanda, aka: homegrown-alpaca!**

**So if this chapter seems completely different to what I usually write, that would be the reasoning for it :) I hope you enjoy our combined efforts to offer you the best Paily we could possibly bring. Hopefully this set up will allow for more frequent updates too :D**

**Please review and tell me what you think of the new set up, I would love some input :)**

* * *

The icy chill of the cold Pennsylvania mornings Emily usually felt when she woke up were not present; a strong warmth engulfed her from behind, heating up every tiny branch in her body, from the tip of her nose to the soles of her feet. She shrugged the sleep from her shoulders, smiling softly when she felt a soft breath on her left ear.

She had fallen asleep at Paige's house last night, the effort she had put into her Chemistry work and the movie they watched had completely exhausted her. She was only expecting to sleep for a few hours –take a short nap cuddled up with Paige. Once she checked her phone for the time and realized it was five thirty in the morning, she guessed they had been more tired than she thought.

Movement from behind her brought her attention back to her surroundings. She was at _Paige's _house; she had fallen asleep in _Paige's _room, in _Paige's _bed – with _Paige_. The smile breaking out across her face was the only way she could express her excitement; the thought of squealing or doing a little dance and waking up Paige by accident was upsetting; she wanted the feeling of being wrapped in Paige's arms to last for as long as it could.

She remained quiet for the next half hour, listening to the shallow breaths next to her ear, each one sending a shiver down her spine and increasing the strange swelling of her heart. It was unreal that she and Paige had really only known each other for this short period of time; Emily's heart felt like it had known Paige for its entire life.

The grip around her waist tightened and Emily felt soft lips press against her exposed left shoulder.

"Good morning," Paige whispered; the huskiness in her voice melting Emily's heart and starting a strange burning in the pit of her stomach.

"Good morning," she responded, rolling over so that she was now facing Paige, tucking a loose strand of auburn hair back behind her ear that, at some point during the night, fallen out of the tight ponytail she usually had her hair in.

"You slept over?" Paige was a little confused, but her smile was charming. She traced small, heart-shaped patterns on the small Emily's back above her shirt, the small gesture short-circuiting Emily's brain momentarily.

"I did. It wasn't planned, I swear." She kissed he tip of Paige's nose, chuckling when Paige scrunched it back.

"That tickles."

"Good. I was aiming for that." The girls lay snuggled up with each other, neither one wanting to leave their coma-like state of bliss, but eventually Paige sighed, stretching her back out and yawning heavily.

"We have school," she sounded sad.

"I know."

"I don't want to go to school."

"I know."

"I want to stay here all day… with you, of course." Paige's smirk was daring, challenging the girl in front of her to accept it; but Emily only rolled her eyes, jutting her bottom lip out after a long sigh.

"I know. Me too."

Paige sat up slowly, glancing over Emily's shoulder, descending back onto the bed next to her fellow swimmer with a mischievous grin. "You know," Paige started, trailing a finger up Emily's forearm, "we do have another five minutes before we _actually _have to start getting ready."

Emily quirked her eyebrows. "Is that so?"

"It is," and then Paige's soft lips were against her own, Paige pulling the comforter over their heads to shield them from the outside world.

* * *

On their way to school. Paige was holding Emily's hand between her own, gently placing it on her lap atop her bag and textbooks, drawing circles into the swimmer's tan palm with her thumb. The ride was spent in a comfortable silence, the radio playing soft, upbeat jazz music in the background, adding to the ever-increasing giddy mood Emily had woken up in.

They arrived at the school parking lot, Paige quickly letting go of Emily's hand as other students filed into view. She held back a sigh, wanting to still hold the other swimmer's hand, but knowing it may take some time before Paige was ready for that.

Emily put her car in park and cut off the engine, turning to face Paige, who had an almost angelic smile forming on her lips.

"See ya in chemistry?" her voice was smooth and her eyes teasing; Emily's heart began to race.

"S-see ya in chemistry," she spat out nervously, watching Paige exit the car, backpack on her shoulders and duffel bag in hand. Her eyes were glued to Paige's backside as she shuffled past a group of girls. Emily scolded herself for looking down there, but then realized Paige couldn't see her anyway, and continued on, watching her hips sway just ever so slightly. A smirk played across her lips as her thoughts traveled to not-so-innocent places; a knock on her window startled her, bringing her back to reality when she looked up into piercing blue eyes, which were practically screaming "_I caught you_."

Damn it, Hanna.

* * *

At lunch, Hanna had brought up going to Noel Kahn's party that Saturday, urging Emily to come with the three of them.

"Em, come on. You've been shacked up with horse girl these past few days." She took a huge bite of her salad before continuing. "I mean, what do you two even _do _that whole time?"

"I don't really think that's any of your business, Han," Aria inquires. Hanna huffs in annoyance, tossing Aria an irritated look before turning her attention back to Emily. "Do you guys even talk, or are you too busy with your tongue in other places?"

"Hanna!" Spencer shouts, throwing a grape at the blonde's forehead, the blush on Emily's cheeks rising at full-force.

"I told you, it's not like that." Emily picked at her own salad, not really eating it, just separating the different colored vegetables into groups. She wouldn't meet the expectant gazes of her three friends, doing everything she could to control the flushing of her cheeks. It was no use; Emily's face was a read as a tomato on a hot summer's day.

"Whatever you say; I saw you checking out horse girl's ass this morning in your car. If you don't want her to catch on, then you should probably stop letting your eyes wander to where the sun don't shine." Spencer and Aria tried to contain their snickers, but to no avail. Eventually, Emily looked up, still slightly horrified that Hanna had seen her looking at Paige like _that _this morning.

"I just… well, I wanted to hang out with Paige this weekend, is all."

"Why don't you ask Paige to come with us, Em?" Aria asked, taking a sip of water.

"I don't think parties are really her thing. I mean, she barely would talk to me when I first met her. I'm not so sure taking her to a rager at Noel Kahn's cabin is such a good idea."

"You'll never know until you ask, right?" Aria was right. Emily didn't know what Paige thought of the whole idea; she wanted to go herself, but she didn't want to push Paige into something that she wasn't ready for. The idea of Paige not enjoying herself was unsettling, but, then again, maybe the other swimmer would actually have a good time.

"Yeah, maybe you're right." A hint of a smile appeared on the swimmer's face. "I'll ask her after practice."

* * *

Surprisingly enough, Emily didn't have to do much convincing for Paige to agree to the party on Saturday.

"Really?" Emily asked, incredulous. She was drying her face with her towel in the locker room, standing next to Paige as the other girls bustled about on the cold, tile floor.

"Yeah, why not?" Paige gave her a charming smile. "Whenever we hang out, it's usually at my place. I wouldn't mind going somewhere you'd like for a change."

Emily was bouncing on her toes, engulfing Paige into a bone-crushing bear hug, the auburn haired girl laughing at her antics for the entire duration of their embrace

* * *

They could hear the music even before pulling into Noel's driveway. The street was littered with cars – some Emily recognized from the school parking lot, others she didn't She parked her Toyota as close to the woods as possible, trying her best to maneuver herself through all of the already hammered teenagers.

She turned off her car and twisted her body so she was facing Paige, the other girl staring at the open door of the cabin with a nervous look on her face.

"Hey," Emily placed her hand over top of Paige's gently, "if you've changed your mind, we can just go back to my place. We don't have to be here if you're not comfortable."

Paige swallowed. "No, Em, i-it's fine. I'll be okay. I just want you to have a good time." Her smile was small, but it filled Emily with enough courage to lean over and place a comforting kiss to her cheek.

"Just stay by my side tonight. I promise I won't let anything happen to you."

The two walked side-by-side up to Noel's front porch, where their host for the evening was all too eager to greet them upon entering.

"Fields! New girl!" His smile was drunk, albeit charming, Emily guessing that other girls would be swooning over Noel Kahn grinning at them as such. Not she or Paige, though. _Definitely _not either one of them.

"Hi Noel," Emily greeted, Paige giving him a small wave.

"I'm so glad you guys could join us here at Casa de Kahn. What changed you mind?" He was asking Emily, but his eyes were glued to Paige the entire time. Emily watched her shift back and forth uncomfortably under his gaze.

"Wanted a change of scenery, I guess. C'mon, Paige," Emily wrapped her finger's around Paige's pale wrist and tugged her inside, leaving Noel by himself out on his wooden porch.

Emily searched the room, looking for any signs of Hanna's blonde hair or a sleeve of Spencer's blazer or the feathered earring of Aria. Her friends were nowhere in sight, even though they had promised Emily that they'd be there long before she and Paige arrived.

"Do you see any of the other girls anywhere," Emily leaned in close to Paige's ear, her grip around her wrist tightening as people shoved them to the side, making Paige cringe. She was silent, offering Emily only a shake of her head before her gaze dropped to the floor.

Emily knew this was a mistake. She could feel Paige's discomfort by just looking at her; it was etched all over her face.

"Maybe this wasn't a good idea," Emily said.

Paige's head shot up, shaking back and for vehemently, "No, Em, I told you I wanted to come here – for you. You wanted to have a good time tonight, and I wanted to be here with you. It's… It's just going to take me a little bit to… get used to all these people."

"You're sure?"

"Are you?" Paige challenged. "You seem less sure than I do."

"I just… I want to protect you, is all. I know you don't do well in crowds."

"As long as I'm with you, I'll be okay." Paige flashed her that award-winning McCullers' charming smile. "Honest."

Emily's heart fluttered. "Okay. Do you want something to drink?"

Paige shook her head. "No thanks. You can go grab something, if you want. I'll just wait here."

"Okay." And with a small smile and squeeze on her wrist, Emily disappeared from Paige's sight, leaving the auburn haired girl alone in a room full of people that she didn't know.

She had lied to Emily. Paige didn't want to ruin Emily's night; the raven-haired girl had seen so optimistic when she had asked about the party after swim practice Tuesday afternoon. Truthfully, Paige was on the verge of an anxiety attack. Her heart was racing as the panic of being around strangers was beginning to settle in the pit of her stomach. This was a bad idea – a really bad idea. She needed to find Emily. She needed to go home.

"Hey," a hand landed roughly on her shoulder, causing Paige to jump out of her skin. "Whoa, jeeze, my bad. I didn't mean to scare you."

Her head whipped around so fast she thought it was going to snap off. It was Noel.

"Why are you standing here all by yourself? Where'd Emily go?"

"To get a drink," Paige mumbled.

"Oh, so you're not mute after all," Noel smirked. "Fields shouldn't have left you alone, though."

"Why is that?"

"Some of the guys here are… well… a little handsy, if you know what I mean."

Paige did know what he meant; the frantic beating of her panicked heart increased. She hugged her arms to her chest and took a step backwards from Noel, who had seemingly inched his way closer to her.

"Don't worry, though…" he trailed off, looking at her expectantly. It was then Paige realized she hadn't introduced herself to Noel yet, not that she really wanted to, anyway.

"Paige."

"…Paige! I'm here, and I won't let anything happen to you." His words were slurred as he backed Paige into a wall, placing his hands on her hips. The swimmer could smell the alcohol on his breath; it made her want to vomit.

"Don't touch me," she squeaked, but the blaring music filling both their ears had effectively deafened the football player. He hadn't heard a thing she said.

Noel pressed her body closer, Paige's own body surging into full on panic. She shoved his body away forcefully, but he recovered, clasping his hands down firmly: one on her hip and one on her shoulder. Noel was just beginning to dip his head down to kiss her, when his body was suddenly ripped away from her and thrown down to the floor.

"Get your hands off of her!" Emily yelled, stomping down forcefully on his gonads. Noel let out a strangled cry, rolling to his side, a grimace on his face.

"What the hell, Fields?!" he shouted, though there was a slight tremble in his voice.

"What the hell _Fields_?" Emily asked, completely taken aback. "What the hell _Kahn_! You just tried to force yourself onto someone, and you're asking me what the hell _my _problem is? You're disgusting!" Emily snarled, dumping her drink all over his face before grabbing Paige's hand forcefully and yanking the taller girl out of the door.

Paige was visibly shaking by the time Emily could see her properly outside. Her eyes welled with unshed tears and her bottom lip quivered viciously; Paige looked terrified, afraid for her life.

"Paige…" Emily reached out to touch her cheek, but the other girl jumped back, a choked sob escaping her throat. Emily's heart shattered. She knew coming to this party was a bad idea.

"Paige, it's okay – it's okay," but to the auburn haired girl, it wasn't. Her body was on panic-stricken overdrive; her heart raced wildly in her chest and she could stop her hands from trembling. All she wanted was to be in Emily's arms, to feel safe, but the thought of being around anyone right now terrified her to the point where she thought she was going to throw up.

She could see the terror on Emily's face and she wanted to open her mouth, reassure Emily that she just needed a few minutes, but she couldn't speak. Paige hugged her arms tighter over her chest as violent sobs rippled throughout her body. She wanted to get out of here – she wanted to leave.

"Do you want me to take you back to your house?" Emily asked on the verge of her own tears. She had never seen Paige so upset before – it was earth shattering.

Paige ferociously shook her head, tossing that idea out into the garbage. If she went home to her parents in this state, they would never let her hang out with Emily again, and that was something she could not handle.

"Well, do you want to come back to my house? My mother is out for the weekend." Paige considered the idea, eventually nodding slowly. Emily nodded as well, leading Paige back to her Corolla, managing to keep a safe three-feet distance between them, though all she wanted to do was take Paige into her arms and never let her go.

* * *

They arrived at Emily's house a half hour later; Paige still hadn't uttered a single word. The car ride was filled with an uncomfortable silence. Emily had exhausted her efforts trying to get Paige to open up, but the other girl remained dead silent for the duration of the trip.

Paige made a hasty retreat to Emily front door, pacing across the expanse of the porch until Emily had unlocked it. She raced inside and hysterically searched the house for something, darting in and out of rooms and sprinting up the stairs until she found Emily's bathroom, throwing the door open and locking herself inside. Emily ran up behind her and wiggled on the door knob, but it was no use – Paige had already shut her out.

"Paige," Emily knocked frantically, her head swimming from the loss of oxygen from the sudden obstacle course-like chase she had just engaged in with Paige. She could hear muffled sobs on the other side of the door, and her quick, soft knocks turned into incessant banging. "Paige!"

It was a few minutes later that Paige cracked open the bathroom door. She stared at Emily, her eyes wild and bloodshot; Emily stood frozen as she took in Paige's state of disarray.

The other girl looked absolutely broken: her cheeks were red and puffy with black smudges from her running mascara; her hair was in a tangled mess (mostly from raking her fingers through her auburn tresses); and her body was still trembling (not as badly as before, but it was still pretty bad).

They held eye contact for a full minute before Paige broke away to glance at Emily's half-opened bedroom door. Emily nodded, offering a hand that Paige, much to Emily's surprise and delight, took with one of her own, and lead the girl across the hall and onto the sand-colored carpet of her bedroom floor. She shut the door behind them and led Paige over to the window seat, a fraction of a smile dancing across the pale girls lips.

"Cool window seat," she said so quietly Emily had almost missed it. "I've always wanted one of these."

"Paige," Emily rested a warm hand on Paige's jean-clad thigh, feeling the muscles beneath her tense up under her touch. She pulled her hands away and shifted to the other side of the bench. "I'm so-" her sentence was cut short as she let herself cry for the first time tonight. "Paige, I'm _so _sorry."

Paige only nodded, her own cries resuming shortly after Emily's began. Emily was staring at the side of Paige's face, refusing to scoot any closer to the girl until given permission to do so. She had no idea how to fix this, to make Paige feel better. She had no idea what she was doing; that scared her even more.

"If I would have known… Noel… he… I'm sorry." Emily buried her face into her knees, which she had pulled tight against her chest. She felt movement from her left, and suddenly Paige was sitting next to her. She hadn't touched Emily yet, but she was sitting beside her, looking at Emily expectantly. Paige cocked her head to the side as she let the tears fall from her eyes. Emily reached out and cupped her face gently, happy when Paige didn't flinch or pull away from her touch. She wiped the tears from Paige's face with the pad of her thumb, the two sitting in silence until their tears had ceased to fall any more.

"I should have taken you with me to get a drink," Emily's voice was hoarse, stale from all of her crying. "I had a bad feeling about that party going into it. Something about just being there was giving me a bad vibe."

Paige laughed softly. It was one of the most beautiful sounds Emily had ever heard.

"What?"

"Bad vibe, Em?" Paige was speaking so quietly Emily had to strain her ears just to hear it. "I didn't realize we were in the 70s."

"Don't make fun of me," she smiled for the first time that night. She stood up, holding out her hands for Paige to take. When they were both standing, hand in hand, Emily walked them over to the bed, taking off her shoes and sliding under the covers, motioning for Paige to come and join her. The other girl was hesitant, but soon complied, kicking off her own shoes and slipping beside Emily on the large mattress. Emily rested their foreheads together and gazed into Paige's dopey brown eyes, where she was still able to make out small traces of fear. She reached out to stroke her cheek again, this time Paige melting into her touch, her eyes fluttering closed. Paige blindly reached for Emily's waist and tugged the tan skinned girl towards her, burying her face into Emily's neck.

"I'm sorry for freaking out," Paige whispered against Emily's shoulder, her hot breath sending shivers down Emily's spine.

"_You _should not be apologizing to _me_. I'm sorry, Paige. I'll never do anything like that to you ever again. And don't you worry; sober Noel will _definitely _be getting a piece of my mind on Monday morning. I promise."

Paige leaned back so she could look into Emily's chocolate brown eyes once more. "Thank you."

"For what?"

"For saving me tonight. I don't know what I'd do without you, Em."

And with that, Paige scooted forward, capturing Emily lips in a gentle kiss, breaking apart after a few minutes only to bury her head back against the soft, warm skin at the base of Emily's neck.

"Go to sleep, Paige. It'll be better in the morning. I promise."


End file.
